Preamble

The House met at Eleven o'Clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL WAR EFFORT

Small Builders

Major York: asked the Minister of Labour whether he will reconsider the position of small builders who, because of war conditions, were forced to close their business and who subsequently became liable for direction under D.R. 58A; and whether he can now allow them to leave their present employment in order to reopen their business.

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ernest Bevin): I could not give any general undertaking to do this, as so much depends on the circumstances of individual cases, but in appropriate cases I would certainly meet such requests so far as that can be done without detriment to the national interest.

Major York: Will the right hon. Gentleman release builders, of the kind referred to in the Question, who have been directed from the North to London, as soon as circumstances in London allow?

Mr. Bevin: They will all be released as soon as circumstances in London allow.

Metal and Engineering Industries (Accidents)

Sir Herbert Williams: asked the Minister of Labour why the number of accidents in the metal and engineering industries as between 1938 and 1943 has shown an increase at least 10 times as great as the proportionate increase in the number of women employed in those industries.

Mr. Bevin: I am afraid I do not follow the calculations in the Question, but I am advised that, in spite of counter-measures, the number of accidents to women in these industries would naturally be expected to increase under war conditions by a substantially greater percentage than the percentage increase in the numbers of women employed, owing to a combination of accident-producing factors, such as have been referred to in the annual reports of the Chief Inspector. I am glad, however, to say that, as mentioned in the Report for 1943, there was in that year a fall in the accident rate for women employed in those munition industries which are the chief sources of accidents to women.

Sir H. Williams: Has not my right hon. Friend seen the figures published in the "Ministry of Labour Gazette" this month, on which this Question is based?

Mr. Bevin: I am afraid I have not read them.

Mr. Ellis Smith: Does my right hon. Friend agree that these figures are a reflection of the magnificent war effort of the women in the British engineering industry, and that some people in this House opposed the mobilisation of women at the time?

Retained Factory Workers

Sir Wavell Wakefield: asked the Minister of Labour if the Unemployment Insurance Fund is used to pay those employees who, although they have no work to do and are therefore unemployed, yet are retained and paid by their employers at the request of his Ministry.

Mr. Bevin: As I thought I had made clear to my hon. Friend in reply to his Question last week, these men are not unemployed, and do not therefore qualify for payments from the Unemployment Fund.

Sir W. Wakefield: Is the Minister aware that I asked a question in connection with unemployed people, who have no work to do but are retained on the books of firms? From what sources are these men paid when they have no work to do, and are, therefore, technically unemployed?

Mr. Bevin: People retained in factories are retained in accordance will allocations made on the man-power side. As I explained to my hon. Friend last week,


there are a number of young men who are waiting to be called up and are retained. They are not doing nothing; they are working for the firms.

Directed Mineworker

Mr. Thorne: asked the Minister of Labour if he is aware that Mr. Cordrey has been a member of the ground staff in the R.A.F., having trained in the A.T.C. for three years and six months and passed all examinations and gliding tests, but has now been ordered down a coalmine; and, in view of the fact that this man is six feet six inches tall and has trained for so long, if he will take steps to excuse him from going into the pits.

Mr. Bevin: If my hon. Friend will send me the necessary particulars of the man referred to, including his present address and his registration number under the National Service Acts, I will have inquiries made into the case.

Mr. Thorne: I will try to do that.

Oral Answers to Questions — DEMOBILISATION

Students

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is yet in a position to make any statement about the demobilisation of students who, owing to their service in the Forces, or other work of national importance, have been unable to complete their qualifying courses.

Mr. Bevin: No, Sir.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Does my right hon. Friend anticipate that he will be able to make a statement soon after the House reassembles?

Mr. Bevin: I am afraid not. The circumstances of the war are such that it will work out rather the other way.

Groups and Gratuities (Assessment)

Miss Ward: asked the Minister of Labour, in view of his decision not to count any period of men's temporary release from the Services for work of national importance for demobilisation purposes or assessment of gratuity, if he will state how, as these men are in fact Service personnel, they are to have their demobilisation groups and gratuities assessed.

Mr. Bevin: Both their age and service release groups and their war gratuities will be assessed by reference to their whole-time service in the Armed Forces since 3rd September, 1939, which counts for Service pay.

Miss Ward: What is my right hon. Friend going to do about those people who have been attached to the Ministry of Economic Warfare?

Mr. Bevin: I must have notice of that question.

Miss Ward: Is my right hon. Friend not aware that it is because of those people that I put down the Question?

Mr. Bevin: There is no indication in the Question that the Ministry of Economic Warfare was referred to. I did not know what the hon. Member meant.

Miss Ward: asked the Minister of Labour whether he will give an assurance that any Service personnel temporarily released for work of national importance while serving abroad will be entitled to have such service assessed for purposes of demobilisation and gratuity.

Mr. Bevin: No, Sir.

Miss Ward: Will my right hon. Friend relate Question 4 to that answer, and say how those people are going to have their gratuities assessed when they are not regarded as being borne on the War Office Vote?

Mr. Bevin: If they are in civil employment, and getting civil pay, periods of release are not assessed for war service. Otherwise, they would be paid twice.

Miss Ward: What is to happen to people serving abroad, who are temporarily released in order to do war work of that sort?

Mr. Bevin: I understand that the hon. Member is asking about people who are temporarily in civil employment, and who are receiving civil rates of pay while they are so released. If they are getting civil rates of pay, periods of release are not assessed for war service.

Political Agents

Mr. Bellenger: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is prepared to give priority release to political agents serving with the Forces, in anticipation of a general election.

Mr. Bevin: This question is under examination, and I am not at present in a position to make a statement.

Mr. Bellenger: Does that answer imply that my right hon. Friend is prepared to give sympathetic consideration to this class of individual serving in the Forces?

Mr. Bevin: I do not know about sympathy; I will try to deal with the matter practically.

Mr. Reakes: Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that these people are learning some very valuable things while serving with His Majesty's Forces, and that premature release would interrupt their political education?

Oral Answers to Questions — DISABLED PERSONS (EMPLOYMENT) ACT (ADVISORY COUNCIL)

Mr. Bellenger: asked the Minister of Labour whether he has yet set up the National Advisory Council under the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act; and if so, who are its members.

Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir. I have constituted the National Advisory Council under the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act, 1944, and will, if I may, arrange for the list of the members to be circulated in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the list:

The Viscount Ridley, C.B.E., Chairman.
† Mr. W. P. Allen.
Lieut.-Colonel The Hon. J. J. Astor, M.P.
* Brigadier General A. C. Baylay, C.B.E., D.S.O.
† Mr. H. L. Bullock.
Major Sir J. B. Brunel Cohen.
Captain G. Crawshay, J.P., D.L.
† Mr. A. Deakin, C.B.E.
* Mr. E. De Ath.
Chief Commander E. L. Dixon.
Chief Petty Officer L. A. G. Faulkner.
Professor T. Ferguson, M.D., D.Sc., F.R.C.P.E.
* Lieut.-Colonel H. Rivers Fletcher, O.B.E.
Mrs. M. K. Gartside.
Councillor A. Gilzean.
Mr. I. J. Hayward, J.P.
Mr. R. A. Keys.
Dr. R. E. Lane, M.B., B.S., F.R.C.P.
* Mr. W. A. Lee, C.B.E.
† Dame Anne Loughlin, D.B.E.
* Major J. C. Poole, M.C.
Squadron Leader W. Simpson, D.F.C.
Chief Officer G. O. Snow, O.B.E., W.R.N.S.
Major General R. N. Stewart, O.B.E., M.C.
Dr. A. B. Stokes, D.C.H., D.P.M.
Lieut.-Commander G. W. Style, D.S.C., R.N.

Mr. C. G. A. Ward, D.F.M.
† Mr. J. Watson.
Mr. R. Watson-Jones, F.R.C.S.
Lieutenant The Hon. R. F. Wood.
Secretary of the Council: Mr. R. E. Gomme, O.B.E., Ministry of Labour and National Service.
* Appointed after consultation with organisations representing employers.
† Appointed after consultation with organisations representing workers.

Oral Answers to Questions — CATERING WAGES COMMISSION (ASSESSORS)

Sir John Mellor: asked the Minister of Labour whether the assessors have access to communications passing between the Catering Wages Commission and his Ministry relating to matters in respect of which they have been appointed.

Mr. Bevin: Assessors are appointed under the Catering Wages Act, 1943, to be available to the Catering Wages Commission in connection with any investigation or inquiry that the Commission may undertake. I understand that it is the Commission's practice to consult with assessors when their advice is required on specific matters, and it is, of course, for the Commission itself to determine to what extent assessors need to have access to documents for the purpose of discharging their duties.

Sir J. Mellor: May I assume that my right hon. Friend will have no objection, so far as his Department is concerned, to the assessors having access to such communications?

Mr. Bevin: I am not going to be led up that garden. I do not interfere at all with the Commission. If I said that I had no objection that would be an influence one way, and next week, because I had said that, the hon. Member would suggest that I was interfering with the Commission.

Oral Answers to Questions — REQUISITIONED HOUSES (RENTS)

Mr. Channon: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that local authorities requisitioning house property from other Government Departments are paying the same rents as existed in 1939; and whether, in all such fresh requisitioning, he will consider paying the standard rents of these houses together with the rates.

The Minister of Health (Mr. Willink): The possession in requisitioned property is the possession of the Crown, and transfers between Government Departments do not affect the continuity of the requisitioning. The compensation payable is assessed under the Compensation (Defence) Act, 1939, and I have no power to vary the compensation while possession of the property is retained.

Mr. Channon: Does my right hon. and learned Friend think that this is fair treatment to the owners, many of whom would like to go back to their own houses after four years of enforced absence?

Mr. Willink: Any question of compensation is not a matter for me, but for the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Sir H. Williams: Is my right hon. and learned Friend aware that when a house is transferred from one Crown authority to another, the new Crown authority complains about the bad condition, and not about the lower rent?

Oral Answers to Questions — MEDICAL SCHOOLS (WOMEN STUDENTS)

Dr. Edith Summerskill: asked the Minister of Health whether he can now make a statement on the Goodenough Report, including the admission of women students to medical schools.

Mr. Willink: I hope to be able to make a statement early in the New Year.

Oral Answers to Questions — TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING

Advertising (Control)

Mr. Keeling: asked the Minister of Town and Country Planning when the Government propose to introduce legislation to protect country and town from disfigurement by advertisements.

The Minister of Town and Country Planning (Mr. W. S. Morrison): The Government are considering whether further powers are necessary for the control of advertisements, but I am unable to say when any legislation which may be found necessary will be introduced.

Mr. Keeling: I beg to give notice that, after the Recess, I will raise this matter on the Adjournment.

Public Footpaths

Mr. Edmund Harvey: asked the Minister of Town and Country Planning what progress has been made by his Ministry in arrangements to carry out the recommendations of the Scott Commission for the preservation and marking of public footpaths.

Mr. W. S. Morrison: The matter referred to has been considered in conference between the Departments concerned, and I hope to receive a report at an early date.

Mr. Harvey: In the meantime, as paths have been lost continually, would not the Minister consider communicating with local authorities, suggesting that they set up committees to go into this matter? It would cost nothing.

Mr. Morrison: I will consider that.

Oral Answers to Questions — INDIA

Officers, Indian Army (Transfer)

Sir J. Mellor: asked the Secretary of State for India, if he will give an assurance that officers who were compulsorily commissioned into the Indian Army will be enabled, if they wish, to transfer forthwith to the British service.

The Secretary of State for India (Mr. Amery): I am in correspondence with the Government of India as to the extent to which certain categories of officers can properly be said to have been compulsorily commissioned into the Indian Army. When the position has been clarified I hope to make a statement on the question for permission to transfer to the British service.

Political Prisoners

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for India whether he can now assure the House that renewed consideration will be given to the question of releasing those political prisoners in India who are still detained without charge or trial.

Mr. Amery: The authorities in India have constantly under review the cases of persons detained as a result of the Congress disturbances of 1942; and releases are made so far as is compatible with essential considerations of security. I do not think that present circumstances


call for a revision of this policy, which has resulted in a large and progressive reduction in the number of those detained.

Mr. Sorensen: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that he has said nothing about those who had not been charged or tried, but who were arrested before the disturbances took place; and may I ask him if he is aware that last week the Labour Party Conference asked for the release of these prisoners?

Mr. Shinwell: May I also ask whether, if the Minister is aware of the Labour Party decision last week, he will take note of the fact that the Labour Party decision expresses the view of a very large number of people in the country? Ought he not to give this matter reconsideration?

Mr. Amery: I will certainly take note of any decision taken at an important Conference like that.

Mr. McGovern: May I ask if someone could not be placed in complete charge of these political prisoners with a view to reviewing the cases periodically, as many who were arrested are inclined to be forgotten?

Mr. Amery: I can assure the hon. Member that, on the contrary, these cases are reviewed by the Governor of the Province very frequently, and, in the course of this year, I have mentioned that the total number of those detained in the first six months of this year was reduced from 7,400 to 3,000.

Mr. Cove: How can the right hon. Gentleman expect the friendship of the Indian people and the effectiveness of their contribution to the war effort, if he persists in keeping men like Nehru and others in gaol?

Mr. Amery: I think the opinions of those who have been detained were by no means endorsed by the Indian people as a whole.

Mr. Austin Hopkinson: If the right hon. Gentleman is taking into consideration the opinion of the Labour Party on this matter, will he also take into consideration the fact that the Labour Party constitutes a small minority of this House?

Sir John Wardlaw-Milne: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether it is a fact that a considerable number of these political

prisoners could be released immediately if they gave the necessary guarantee of their good behaviour?

Mr. Amery: Yes, Sir, that is so.

Mr. Sorensen: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I will raise this matter at the earliest opportunity.

Malaria and Cholera

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for India if he will state the number of deaths due to malaria and cholera for each quarter from 1938 to the present time; the amount of anti-malarial drugs available during 1944; the total consumption of such drugs annually before the war; and the latest figures for death rates and infantile mortality, if possible distinguishing those due to malaria and cholera.

Mr. Amery: I am circulating the detailed information regarding anti-malarial drugs in the OFFICIAL REPORT. I am asking the Government of India how far they can supply the remainder of the information asked for.

Mr. Sorensen: Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether malaria and cholera have decreased or increased in the last two years?

Mr. Amery: There was a temporary increase in Bengal after the famine period, and that has been very substantially reduced since. I could not give the figures for the whole of India.

Following is the information:

Of synthetic anti-malarial drugs 491½ million tablets were shipped to India in 1943. The shipments in 1944 to date total 632½ million tablets, in addition to 1,000 lbs. of totaquina. Quinine stocks in India in April, 1944, were 244,000 lbs. Indian pre-war production of quinine was 90,000 lbs. a year and is increasing. Pre-war consumption of quinine was about 200,000 lbs. a year and of synthetic antimalarial drugs negligible.

Chamber of Princes

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Secretary of State for India the nature of the dispute between the Indian Princes and the Viceroy.

Mr. Amery: I would refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave on 13th December last to a Question by my hon. Friend the Member for Abingdon (Sir R. Glyn). I am at present unable to add to that answer.

Mr. Sorensen: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman if there has been any development since that time, and if he cannot give us some enlightenment on this interesting dispute?

Mr. Amery: No, Sir.

Provincial Governments

Mr. Edmund Harvey: asked the Secretary of State for India whether consideration is being given to the reintroduction of representative government in any of the provinces in which the administration has been Taken over by the Governor.

Mr. Amery: I can assure the hon. Member that the Governor of each of the Provinces concerned is constantly on the watch for a situation in which a Ministry could be formed with adequate support in the Legislature.

Mr. Harvey: Can we take it that the Government would cordially welcome any proposals for the re-formation of such a Ministry by the competent parties?

Mr. Amery: Certainly, and on at least two occasions where opportunity has offered itself, the Government have taken advantage of it.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIVIL DEFENCE

Air Raid Warning System (Whistles)

Mr. Woodburn: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is now able to relax the prohibition against the use of whistles and other forms of announcement by delivery vans in housing areas.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): While my hon. Friend's suggestion involves various difficulties, and, as he will be aware, whistles are used as air raid warning signals, I sympathise with its object, and I am going into the matter with a view to seeing whether any relaxations Can be made which will not diminish the effectiveness of the warning system. I will communicate with my hon. Friend in due course.

Mr. Woodburn: Will the right hon. Gentleman look into this matter and take into account the fact that, as far as one can judge, the air raid danger is not the same in all parts of the country now, and that, in Scotland and many parts of the North of England, it would be quite possible to relax many of these petty restrictions without any difficulty?

Mr. Morrison: That is one of the points I will bear in mind.

British Subjects (Enemy Broadcasting)

Mr. Keeling: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will issue a Defence Regulation making it an offence to speak on an enemy broadcasting service.

Mr. H. Morrison: I do not think that it would be possible to justify the making of a Defence Regulation declaring to be a crime such an act which involved no offence when it was done. As regards the future, I would not have thought that a Defence Regulation such as my hon. Friend suggests would serve any useful purpose, if only because at this stage of the war few British subjects are likely to be ready and able to broadcast on an enemy broadcasting service. Moreover, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General has already explained to the House, broadcasting with intent to assist the enemy is an offence, which is punishable by death if the offender is convicted of treason or by penal servitude for life if he is convicted of an offence against Defence Regulation 2A.

Mr. Keeling: Does the Minister realise that there is no suggestion in my Question that this penal provision should be antedated, and does he not appreciate that there is a strong feeling in the country that the enemy ought to be deprived of the assistance of British broadcasters, which he evidently thinks is valuable or he would not use them?

Mr. Morrison: It is already an offence if it is shown that the person concerned had the intention to aid the enemy, and, at this stage, I do not think we are losing much by the existing state of the law.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: If this broadcasting is, in fact, of advantage to the enemy, what does it matter whether the intention is to aid the enemy or not? How many of these other Regulations make an in-


tention of aiding the enemy an ingredient of the offence?

Mr. Morrison: There is plenty of variation in the Regulations, and I think my hon. Friend has raised a legal point which was dealt with in the Debate.

Sir W. Wakefield: Is not the use of words on the wireless just as wounding as many a machine-gun bullet; and ought it not to be made an offence, the same as shooting?

Shelter Accident, Bethnal Green (Inquiry)

Mr. Reakes: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he has now considered the transcript of the observations made by the Master of the Rolls when dismissing the appeal of the Bethnal Green Corporation against damages awarded against them in a lower court in connection with the air-raid shelter; and whether he is in a position to make a statement.

Mr. Morrison: I have not yet received the transcript of the judgment delivered by the Master of the Rolls, and I do not therefore feel able to make a statement.

Mr. Reakes: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether, in view of the fact that it is over a week since I put that Question down, there has not been ample time to get the transcript of the observations of the Master of the Rolls in this case?

Mr. Morrison: Well, I have not got it, and therefore I think it would be wrong if I should pass any comment on what has been said by the learned judge until it is available.

Oral Answers to Questions — CHANNEL ISLANDS (SUPPLIES)

Sir John Wardlaw-Milne: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has any further statement to make regarding supplies to the Channel Islands and general conditions there.

Mr. H. Morrison: I am not at present in a position to add to the statement which I made on Tuesday, 12th December, except to say that the International Red Cross Committee, who control the ship which will carry the supplies, say

that there have been certain difficulties which have prevented the ship sailing as soon as had been hoped.

Sir J. Wardlaw-Milne: Do I understand from that reply that the ship has not yet sailed?

Mr. Morrison: There is a report in the Press that it was to sail yesterday, but I understand that that did not take place. It is hoped that it will have sailed this morning, but I am being a little cautious because I do not wish to create disappointment.

Oral Answers to Questions — QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS

The following Question stood on the Order Paper in the name of Mr. LEACH:
40. To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he can make any statement regarding a further alleviation of the present black-out.

Mr. Bowles: In view of the importance of this Question, would the Home Secretary answer it at the end of Questions?

Later—

Mr. Bowles: On a point of Order. I think the House would be glad to have a reply from the Home Secretary to Question No. 40. He does not seem to be in his place. I was wondering whether you, Sir, could help us.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member cannot on a point of Order ask another Member's Question.

Mr. Bowles: If a Minister thinks in his wisdom that he would like to answer a Question which has not been asked, he has the right to do so. If the House desires to have a Question answered, can it not ask the Minister to answer it?

Mr. Speaker: The matter rests with the Minister and not with me. I am sorry that I cannot help the hon. Member.

Mr. Edmund Harvey: May I ask you, Sir, if your attention has been called to the large number of Members who have not been in their place to ask their Questions; and does not that cause great inconvenience to Ministers, and to the House?

Mr. Speaker: I am obliged to the hon. Member for mentioning the matter. I regard it as somewhat discourteous to the


House if one does not trouble to attend when one has put a Question on the Paper.

Mr. Shinwell: May I ask you, Sir, whether you will consider whether it is not possible to make some arrangements with Members that, if practicable, and if circumstances permit, when they have sufficient time, they should notify either yourself or the Minister responsible of their intention not to be present so that the Question may be taken off the Paper and other Members be able to put their Questions?

Mr. Speaker: I will certainly consider whether there is any practicable way of doing that.

Captain Plugge: When a Minister replies to two Questions at the same time he always asks the permission of the two Members. If the first Member is not there to ask his Question, could not the Minister reply to the second?

Mr. Buchanan: As you, Sir, are being asked to commit yourself to a new policy will you consider that circumstances sometimes arise which prevent Members from being present? They have other work to do, sometimes committee work which debars them from coming to the House.

Mr. Speaker: I can assure the hon. Member that I will not act hastily nor willingly make reflections on hon. Members which are unjustifiable.

Mr. Woodburn: Would it not be wise to keep in mind that the Minister of War Transport warned us about the difficulty of travelling in the holiday time and that many who represent distant constituencies have already left?

Mr. Speaker: That should not have prevented hon. Members from withdrawing their Questions.

Miss Rathbone: Would it not be possible to revive the pre-war practice of allowing a Member who cannot be present to transfer his Question to another Member? Would that not meet the difficulty?

Mr. Speaker: I think this is a matter for the House and not for me.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: As we expect Ministers—and they invariably respect the convention—to be in their place to answer Questions, surely Members should obey the same convention and be in their places to ask Questions. It is not a matter that is solely concerned with to-day. It has been going on for a long time.

Mr. Buchanan: Might I ask you to bear in mind, Sir, that the hour for Questions is not the only time for Members to attend the House?

Mr. Speaker: I do certainly bear that in mind.

Oral Answers to Questions — PARLIAMENTARY MACHINERY

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Prime Minister if he will move to appoint a Select Committee to inquire into the future of Parliamentary machinery and consider how it should be adapted to meet the post-war needs and while preserving the rights of private Members function with speed and efficiency.

The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): I have no statement to make on this proposal at the present time.

Mr. Smith: Does not the right hon. Gentleman consider that the Report prepared by the Committee on the Rebuilding of the House of Commons is a good one, and if so, is not the next logical step to take to set up a Select Committee to consider the machinery that is going to function in the new House, and will he also remind the Prime Minister that, when the last Committee was considering this, the right hon. Gentleman gave evidence before it of the character contained in this Question?

Mr. Attlee: That is under consideration.

Captain Duncan: Does not the right hon. Gentleman agree that Parliamentary machinery is not the cause of the delay but that the delay occurs in Government Departments in drawing up Bills?

Mr. McGovern: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that one of the best things that could happen in connection with the Parliamentary machine is to free Members from the power of the outside power machines that are operating against Members of this House and constituency needs?

Oral Answers to Questions — AFFORESTATION

Sir William Davison: asked the Prime Minister whether his attention has been called to the devastation of our already insufficient woodlands by the cutting down of trees during the present war to meet urgent national needs for timber; and what steps are being taken to make good this loss to the nation's security and health and increase our timber acreage from the lowest in Europe by planting some of the 7,000,000 acres of waste land which is unsuitable for agriculture.

Mr. Attlee: Sir, I think it is one of the most important things in the life of our country. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will do his very best at any time to help it; but he asks my hon. Friend to wait for some abatement of the pressure of the war before making definite proposals.

Sir W. Davison: Do the Government recognise the necessity of making an immediate start by the establishment of training centres for the training of men suitable for forestry work, so that there may be no delay in dealing with what, I am glad to hear, the Government consider to be a very important matter immediately after the war?

Mr. Attlee: That is rather a different matter, and perhaps my hon. Friend will put down a Question about training.

Mr. J. J. Lawson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that it has already been announced in the House that these woodlands and, indeed, the trunks of trees that are being torn down will be restored, and that it is only a matter of giving a decision; and will he bear in mind the fact that we have only a few rare clumps of trees in some industrial districts and that they are being taken away; and is it not necessary, for the purposes of amenity, to replace those trees?

Mr. Attlee: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend.

Sir W. Davison: But surely this is all part of the same question, and it is an urgent matter that these men should be trained now, so as to be able to take up the work immediately after the war?

Mr. Attlee: I am not denying the point but only suggesting that, if the hon. Member needs a proper reply, he should put the Question down.

Oral Answers to Questions — INDUSTRIAL INJURIES INSURANCE (MINISTERIAL RESPONSIBILITY)

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Prime Minister whether the Home Secretary or the Minister of National Insurance will be in charge of the Industrial Injuries Insurance Bill; and which Minister will in future be responsible for the administration of the existing Workmen's Compensation Acts.

Mr. Attlee: As the Industrial Injuries Insurance Bill will provide that the central administrative responsibility shall rest on the Minister of National Insurance, it has been arranged between the Home Secretary and the Minister that responsibility for the further work in connection with the Bill shall be transferred to the latter Minister. It is also proposed that there shall be at an early date an Order in Council transferring to the Minister the functions at present exercised by the Home Secretary under the existing law relating to Workmen's Compensation.

Mr. Smith: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there are very satisfactory consultative arrangements between the Home Office officials and the representative organisations engaged in industry, and is it the intention of the Government to maintain those arrangements under the new Ministry?

Mr. Attlee: Oh, yes, Sir. All those arrangements will be retained.

Sir H. Williams: Will the Inspectorate of Factories be transferred to the same Ministry, as it has a close connection with the matter?

Mr. Attlee: That appears to be another question.

Sir H. Williams: Oh, no, industrial injuries do occur in factories.

Oral Answers to Questions — LIBERATED COUNTRIES (ELECTIONS)

Mr. Vernon Bartlett: asked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the political difficulties involved in holding elections in liberated countries and of the importance of holding such elections with the least possible delay, he will propose the establishment of a United Nations commission to arrange and to supervise


elections in those liberated countries which would welcome the commission's co-operation.

Mr. Attlee: I can see no advantage in a general commission of the sort suggested by the hon. Member. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary informed the House yesterday that His Majesty's Government would be prepared to help in supervising elections in Greece and would welcome the co-operation of their Allies. We should no doubt do our best to give similar assistance elsewhere if conditions demanded it and if it were clearly desired and requested by the Government and people concerned. But I believe and sincerely hope that such exceptional measures, involving close intervention in the affairs of another State, will not prove to be necessary in other liberated countries.

Mr. Edmund Harvey: Would not my right hon. Friend bear in mind the great success of the Saar Commission and similar experiments and international provisions?

Mr. Attlee: My hon. Friend will remember that was ex-enemy territory under certain very definite conditions. It is quite another matter going into a country which has a Government of its own and one has to wait there for an invitation or request.

Mr. Bartlett: Is it not a fact that in the Question, I made it clear that we should have to wait for an invitation or request, but is it not probable that the Governments in these different countries would be very much strengthened if they had support from the Allies and that support, as far as possible, should be civilian rather than military in nature?

Mr. Attlee: That is a matter for the Allies. I think I have answered my hon. Friend's Question and the answer shows our complete readiness to give assistance in all things where it is desired.

Sir H. Williams: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that we have already passed three Acts of Parliament, have had one Speaker's Conference, and that there are two more Acts in the background before we can arrange an election in this not very disturbed country?

Oral Answers to Questions — GREECE

Monarchy

Mr. Driberg: asked the Prime Minister if, with a view to restoring peace in Athens, he will invite the King of the Hellenes to state publicly that he has no intention of returning to Greece until after the question of the monarchy has been settled by free plebiscite of the Greek people, and that he is willing, meanwhile, that a Regent acceptable to all parties should be appointed.

Mr. Attlee: I have nothing to add to the statement made by the Foreign Secretary yesterday in the course of the Debate.

Mr. Driberg: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that, as the Foreign Secretary can confirm, he did not deal yesterday with the particular point in the first part of the Question; and, while there is universal agreement that there should be a free plebiscite on the question of the Monarchy, is there not a danger that that might be prejudiced by the premature return of the King?

Mr. Quintin Hogg: Will the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that the Conservative candidate for Maldon will not be allowed to address his constituents until after the result of the election is known?

Mr. Shinwell: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether he has taken note of the fact that last night a statement was made on the radio of the fact that M. Papandreou had declared that the decision to establish a Regency in Greece had been communicated to the King as a unanimous decision of the Greek Cabinet, and if that is true, what is the obstacle which stands in the way?

Mr. Attlee: I am afraid I did not hear the radio and, therefore, I have had no time to consider that matter.

Dr. Edith Summerskill: Is it proposed that the wishes of one man, the King of Greece, shall be allowed to stand in the way of a settlement of this problem?

Sir J. Wardlaw-Milne: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether it is not the case, however desirable the objects which the hon. Gentleman who put this Question down may have in view, that to take the action he suggests would be


a most unwarranted interference in the affairs of the Greek people?

Mr. Driberg: It is unwarranted interference to foist this King on them.

Mr. G. Strauss: Is it the fact that the King has never agreed to the unanimous demands of the Cabinet not to return to Greece until after an election has been held, nor has he agreed, as far as we know, to the recent demand of the Cabinet to appoint a Regency? May I ask whether these are the facts and, if so, is it not a time when His Majesty's Government could interfere with great benefit in the Greek situation?

Mr. Attlee: A very full opportunity was given for a Debate on these matters yesterday. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] The Foreign Secretary made a statement and I really cannot go into these detailed arguments of the hon. Member at the present time.

Elections

Mr. Edmund Harvey: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether with a view to promoting a satisfactory settlement in Greece, consideration will be given to the appointment of an international electoral commission to ensure fair elections and the proper representation of all parties.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. George Hall): As my right hon. Friend declared to the House yesterday, we shall be prepared to give any assistance in our power in the conduct of elections in Greece if we are invited to do so, and we should welcome the assistance of any of our Allies in this task.

Mr. Harvey: In view of the fact that our Minister has already made valuable suggestions to the Greek Government, could he not make a suggestion for an international commission of this kind to ensure an impartial election?

Mr. Hall: A very full statement was made yesterday. I think the hon. Member should leave it there.

Mr. Cocks: Could the Foreign Secretary use his very great influence and see if he could not secure a Christmas truce, so that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Stockton (Mr. Macmillan) can.

get on with his work, unimpaired by ultimatums and bombs?

Air Operations (Historic Buildings)

Mr. Driberg: (by Private Notice) asked the Secretary of State for Air, if he will issue an instruction that, in any air operations that may take place over Athens and other ancient Greek cities, the utmost care is to be taken to avoid causing further damage to the Parthenon and other monuments of special historic importance.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Air (Commander Brabner): Yes, Sir, subject to the necessities of operations.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE

Tank Range (Land Restoration)

Mr. Parker: asked the Minister of Agriculture what steps have been taken to prevent coast erosion at a tank range, of which he has been informed, where the sea wall has been shot out; whether steps are to be taken to remove live shells in the wall and nearby marshes; and whether the marshes are to be restored to their former state of growing wild white clover seed.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture (Mr. Tom Williams): I understand that there is no breach in the sea wall, but that the Catchment Board have been prevented from gaining access to this wall to carry out maintenance work owing to the presence of live shells, and this has resulted in some erosion. The problem of removing explosive objects remaining after military activities is a difficult one and is engaging the urgent attention of my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for War.

Mr. Parker: Could not action be taken against the people who suggested using good land below sea level for this purpose instead of using land above sea level which does not matter at all in the neighbourhood?

Mr. Williams: I should have thought that that might be a question for the Secretary of State for War.

Pigs (Feeding-Stuffs)

Mr. Driberg: asked the Minister of Agriculture if he can now consider some increase in the ration of feeding-stuffs for domestic keepers of pigs.

Mr. T. Williams: No, Sir. Supplies do not permit of any such increase.

Mr. Driberg: Is this policy reviewed from time to time as the shipping situation alters?

Mr. Williams: It is more or less always under review but I had better warn my hon. Friend that, should supplies become easier, I think first call would be from commercial pig producers and poultry keepers who have been kept on such low rations of feeding-stuffs for their stocks for a long time.

Oral Answers to Questions — WAR CHARITIES (REGISTRATION)

Major Sir Jocelyn Lucas: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will consider amending the War Charities Act, so that any society or person in reply to the statutory advertisement, giving information to the authorities as to why a proposed charity should not be registered, will be exempt from action for libel or slander.

Mr. H. Morrison: Under the War Charities Act there is a statutory obligation to give public notice, as prescribed, of the intention to apply for registration of a war charity, and of the time within which, and the place at which, objections to the application may be made. I am advised that in such circumstances qualified privilege would attach to any objection made, and that there would appear, therefore, to be no necessity for amending legislation in this respect.

Sir J. Lucas: While I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his reply, is he aware that in certain circumstances it is practically impossible to prevent registration, and that the Act badly needs strengthening?

Mr. Morrison: On the point in the Question, I think that if a person makes objection, without malice and in the public interest, he has nothing to fear. I do not think that the law is unsatisfactory in this respect.

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION

Aided Schools (Tuition Fees)

Mr. Parker: asked the Minister of Education whether no fees are to be charged from 1st April next, under Section 61 (1) of the Education Act, 1944, in schools which are now in the category

of aided, deficiency aided, schools, since these schools are in effect being maintained by the L.E.A.

The Minister of Education (Mr. Butler): Under the Education Act, 1944, tuition fees in secondary schools at present receiving their grant in the form of aid from local education authorities, will be abolished as from the date on which they become voluntary schools maintained by the authority. During the transitional period between 1st April, 1945, and the date on which they become so maintained, it is contemplated that local education authorities will assist them to the extent necessary under Section 9 (I) of the Act. Such assistance will require my authority and as one of the conditions of authorising it I propose to require that tuition fees shall be abolished in the school.

Secondary Teachers (Remuneration Scales)

Sir J. Mellor: asked the Minister of Education whether, failing agreement with the secondary associations represented on the Burnham Committee, he will refrain from making an Order under Section 89 of the Education Act, determining graduate allowances, training additions and allowances for special posts, until after he has consulted the House of Commons.

Mr. Butler: When the Burnham Committee comes to submit scales of remuneration for teachers to me the information will be available to hon. Members, and it will then be open to my hon. Friend to take such action as he thinks fit to secure their consideration by this House. I would, however, remind him that the functions of the Minister under Section 89 of the Education Act, 1944, are limited to approving or disapproving the scales of remuneration submitted to him by the Burnham Committee and, if he approves them, to making an order requiring local education authorities to remunerate teachers in accordance with those scales. It was made quite clear when the Clause, which is now Section 89, was introduced in another place that it was so drafted as to leave no responsibility with the Minister for framing the scales or amending scales submitted to him.

Mr. Cove: May I now ask the right hon. Gentleman, if the House interferes in the manner suggested by the Question,


whether it would not defeat the very purpose of the Section mentioned, and also destroy the very negotiating power that he himself has set up under the Act? Would it not destroy the Burnham Committee?

Mr. Butler: I do not think it is quite as simple as that. The important thing is that I shall take my decision as laid down by the Statute. I cannot regulate the proceedings of the House.

Sir J. Mellor: As my right hon. Friend abolished the secondary Burnham Committee, and the secondary teachers now find themselves in a small minority in the new general Burnham Committee, is it right that the secondary teachers should have their fate largely determined——

Mr. Speaker: That is an argument and not a question. Mr Lindsay.

Sir J. Mellor: May I——

Mr. Speaker: If the hon. Gentleman will ask his question properly, and not make an argument, it is quite all right.

Sir J. Mellor: Is it right that the secondary teachers should have their fate decided by the National Union of Teachers to which they do not belong?

Mr. Butler: A short answer to my hon. Friend is that "secondary" has a new application under the Education Act, 1944, and implies every form of secondary education that will be given. People will have to get accustomed to that definition.

Miss Rathbone: Will my right hon. Friend tell us how soon after the Recess he is likely to be able to make a statement on this question on which, as he knows, there is extremely widespread anxiety among secondary teachers, and especially among university graduates?

Mr. Butler: I am, of course, aware of this anxiety, to which every attention naturally ought to be paid, but I cannot regulate the proceedings of this House which are in the hands of hon. Members and should be arranged through the ordinary channels.

Building Industry (Recruitment)

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: asked the Minister of Education how many boys are now being trained for the building industry in junior technical schools and other comparable institutions; and how many recruits are needed annually for this industry.

Mr. Butler: In May last, the last date for which figures are available, the number of boys attending junior technical schools for building in England and Wales was 8,882. I am informed that the Building Apprenticeship and Training Council estimate that, assuming the wastage in the industry is made good exclusively by apprentices, the normal annual intake required would be 25,000 including Scotland.

Mr. Lindsay: In view of the fact that the school-leaving age cannot be raised for a year and a half, and that 90 per cent. of British boys leave school at the age of 14, will my right hon. Friend consider lowering the age of apprenticeship to 14 to fill this gap, and also see that some part day-time release is made possible for these boys?

Mr. Butler: I am ready to consider any proposal to increase the number of these courses, because they are much better than they were before, but I cannot give a definite undertaking at this stage.

Conference of Allied Ministers

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: asked the Minister of Education how many meetings of the Conference of Allied Ministers have so far taken place; what executive responsibility the conference has been given; what is the relation of the conference to U.N.R.R.A.; and which body is responsible for providing educational equipment to European countries where the needs are urgent.

Mr. Butler: The Conference has held 14 meetings and in addition its Executive Bureau has met on 25 occasions. Within the limits of its budget, the Conference has taken what steps it could to lay plans for assisting Allied Governments to restore their educational services and for promoting future co-operation in educational matters among the United Nations. U.N.R.R.A. has disclaimed responsibility for procuring or providing finance for educational materials or services, but will be kept in close touch with the work of the Conference. The responsibility for the supply of educational equipment rests primarily upon the Governments concerned, but the Conference took an active part in drafting the project for a United Nations Organisation for Educational and Cultural Reconstruction which will furnish a means of assisting in the provision of this much needed equipment.

Mr. Lindsay: In view of the initiative taken by my right hon. Friend, could he say how many nations are required to confirm the tentative draft constitution before it can become workable, and whether he will now give a second initiative by confirming it by His Majesty's Government?

Mr. Butler: The answer to the first part of the supplementary question is 20; the answer to the second part is that I think we can be very hopeful.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNITED STATES FORCES (DUTY-FREE PARCELS)

Mr. Bowles: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will allow American soldiers on the Continent to send free of duty four parcels a year to friends in this country as he allows British soldiers to do.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir John Anderson): Yes, Sir. This concession is already available to members of the United States Forces serving in Europe.

Mr. Bowles: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether he will look at a letter I have received from an American soldier, referring to five or six different ranks, in which it is said that they have been asked by recipients of parcels in this country not to send any more because the duty is so heavy that it is really a financial embarrassment to the recipient?

Sir J. Anderson: Perhaps I might relieve my hon. Friend's mind by telling him that the arrangement came into force on the first day of this month.

Oral Answers to Questions — FRANCE (CURRENCY)

Mr. Shinwell: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether any approach has been made to the French Government in order to faciliate the conclusion of a currency agreement, which will enable that country to enter the sterling area.

Sir J. Anderson: No, Sir.

Mr. Shinwell: If not, why not? Is it not of the utmost importance that we should seek to bring France into the sterling area? Is it not, indeed, to our ultimate and financial advantage? Why has not such an approach been made?

Sir J. Anderson: My hon. Friend is very severe, but I think he is under a misapprehension. Negotiations for a financial agreement which will, I think, be to our mutual advantage are in progress, but that is a very different matter from enlarging the sterling area to include other countries; there are technical points arising in that connection.

Mr. Shinwell: I am obliged to my right hon. Friend. That is quite a different answer. If negotiations are proceeding with a view to the creation of some financial understanding, I am gratified, as it may ultimately include some arrangement for the sterling area.

Sir J. Anderson: Of course it would include some arrangement about the sterling area, but not the arrangement indicated in my hon. Friend's Question.

Mr. Shinwell: But will my right hon. Friend get his officials to answer Questions in a proper fashion?

Sir J. Anderson: I answered the Question.

Mr. E. P. Smith: Can my right hon. Friend say whether this tentative agreement will cover the question of double taxation?

Sir J. Anderson: No, Sir, that is a separate question.

Oral Answers to Questions — OPENCAST COAL PRODUCTION

Mr. Keeling: asked the Minister of Fuel and Power what change is being made in the responsibility for opencast coal production.

The Minister of Fuel and Power (Major Lloyd George): For the last two years the Ministry of Works have been responsible for the processes of exploratory boring, extraction of the coal on approved sites and the provision of loading and treatment facilities, while I have been responsible for determining which sites should be worked and for disposing of the coal on the market. I have now arranged with my right hon. Friend that responsibility for all the work should be vested in one Department and that, as Minister of Fuel and Power, I should undertake this responsibility. It is proposed that the transfer should take place as from the end of the present financial year, and the Estimates of the two Departments for 1945–46 will be prepared on that basis.

Oral Answers to Questions — HAIR COMBS (SHORTAGE)

Sir W. Davison: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware of the shortage of hair combs, which in many places are not obtainable; and if he will take steps to deal with this matter.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Captain Waterhouse): Yes, Sir. As my right hon. Friend said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Sir W. Edge) on 26th September, he is doing all he can to improve supplies.

Sir W. Davison: But is not my right hon. and gallant Friend aware that a large proportion of the population no longer wear hats, and that under those circumstances a comb is essential to make seemly their disordered and frequently dishevelled locks?

Captain Waterhouse: Desirable as combs are, the labour and material for providing them are very short. Nevertheless, it has been possible in the last quarter to increase production by no less than half a million combs.

Mr. Messer: Can we ask the large number of hon. Members in this House who do not need combs, to give them up?

Oral Answers to Questions — BRITISH HEAVY TANKS (MANUFACTURE)

Mr. Hammersley: asked the Minister of Supply whether every priority is being given to the manufacture of a British heavy tank.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply (Mr. John Wilmot): Yes, Sir.

Mr. Hammersley: Does that reply mean that the Government now recognise the importance of, and necessity for, a heavily armoured tank?

Mr. Wilmot: I do not think it would be in the public interest to give details of tanks, which are given priority.

Mr. Hammersley: My supplementary question was not in relation to any details. I asked whether the Government now recognise the need and necessity for a heavily armoured tank?

Mr. Wilmot: I think the hon. Member will find the answer in the reply to his main Question.

Mr. Shinwell: While not expecting the Government to furnish any details which might afford any comfort to the enemy, or in any way infringe the need for security, have they taken notice of the fact that the Germans, in their latest push, have been using tanks of very heavy calibre, much heavier than those at our disposal? Are the Government giving that matter their very careful consideration?

Mr. Wilmot: I do not think it will be wise to add to the answer I have given.

Mr. Stokes: Can my hon. Friend assure the House, without giving away any definite information, whether any tank now proposed is better than anything which the enemy have?

Oral Answers to Questions — BACON RATION

Sir W. Wakefield: asked the Minister of Food if he is aware that the fat American bacon used to make up the bacon ration in Swindon and district is rancid and in some cases uneatable; and what steps he is taking to see that this fat is properly used and not wasted and that other food is provided in lieu of bacon in view of the bacon shortage.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Food (Mr. Mabane): I should be obliged if my hon. Friend would supply me with particulars of the case he has in mind when I shall be glad to make inquiries. With regard to the last part of the Question I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given to the hon. Member for Streatham (Mr. Robertson) on 13th December.

Sir W. Wakefield: Is my right hon. Friend aware that many complaints have been sent by residents in Swindon and district to his food officer, and that he can get full information as to the difficulties described in my Question by consulting his officer there?

Oral Answers to Questions — SUPPLIES TO CHINA (BRITISH AIR TRANSPORT)

Mr. John Dugdale: asked the Secretary of State for Air whether any British aeroplanes are now taking supplies to China.

Commander Brabner: Yes, Sir, though in small quantities. The main supply programme to China is undertaken by United States aircraft.

Mr. Dugdale: Can the hon. and gallant Gentleman give us rather more detailed information? Do "small quantities" mean six, seven, eight or ten aeroplanes going in regularly, each week or month, and, if so, how much are they taking?

Commander Brabner: I do not think it right or proper to give details about these transport aircraft, but I can say that it was agreed that the Americans should bear the main burden of this programme as most of our aircraft are operating in Burma.

Mr. Dugdale: Are we not sending in supplies by our own aircraft?

Commander Brabner: Supplies are being sent to China, but the great burden of the transport is being borne by American aircraft.

Mr. Edgar Granville: Do British machines come back empty to India from China and, if so, would the hon. and gallant Member suggest to the War Office that they might be used to transport returning soldiers?

Oral Answers to Questions — BRITISH ARMY (DISBANDED UNIT)

Lieut.-Colonel Windsor-Clive: asked the Secretary of State for War whether he has considered the representations made to him from several different sources since the beginning of October regarding the behaviour of men of a unit whose name has been communicated to him; and what action he proposes to take.

The Financial Secretary to the War Office (Mr. Arthur Henderson): Yes, Sir. My hon. and gallant Friend will have received a letter about this matter. Owing to a reduction in strength it has been decided that this unit is to be disbanded and steps are being taken to send the men elsewhere.

Oral Answers to Questions — ITALIAN PRISONERS OF WAR (ESCAPE)

Sir T. Moore: asked the Secretary of State for War whether he has any state-

ment to make regarding the escape of over 90 Italian prisoners from a prisoners-of-war camp in the West of Scotland.

Mr. Arthur Henderson: Ninety-seven Italian non-co-operator prisoners escaped from a prisoner-of-war camp in Scotland during the night of 15th-16th December. Eighty-nine have so far been recaptured. A full inquiry into the circumstances is being made.

Sir T. Moore: As these escapes are becoming disconcertingly frequent, is the Minister satisfied that security arrangements in prisoners-of-war camps are satisfactory?

Mr. Henderson: I cannot accept the suggestion in the first part of the hon. and gallant Gentleman's supplementary question, but as regards the second part, the answer is in the affirmative.

Oral Answers to Questions — OCCUPIED GERMANY (EDUCATION)

Mr. Vernon Bartlett: asked the Secretary of State for War what plans exist for the restoration of education in those parts of Germany from which the control of the German Government has been removed.

Mr. Arthur Henderson: Very careful consideration has been given to this important question. It is clear that the first step to be taken before German schools can be reopened is a thorough purge of teachers and educational administrators and the elimination of Nazi text-books. When this has been done and sufficient acceptable teachers are available, schools will be progressively re-opened, as and when the military situation permits, priority being given to elementary schools.

Mr. Bartlett: While thanking the Minister for that helpful reply, may I ask him whether he will bear in mind the importance of getting United Nations' agreement on the curricula to be used in schools, because if there are to be different zones of occupation it is important that on such questions as the teaching of history, for instance, there should be a United Nations' curricula?

Mr. Henderson: I will bear my hon. Friend's suggestion in mind.

Sir T. Moore: Are any steps being taken to substitute text-books for the Nazi text-books that are being or will be destroyed?

Mr. Henderson: I shall require notice of that Question.

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: In view of General Eisenhower's recent broadcast, who is ultimately responsible for the policy which was announced in that broadcast?

Mr. Henderson: I regret to say that I shall require notice of that Question, also.

Mr. Shinwell: Before directing attention to the re-education of the German people would it not be useful to re-educate some of the Tory Members of this House?

Oral Answers to Questions — BRITISH COUNCIL (INQUIRY)

Mr. Petherick: asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what is the scope and purpose of Sir Findlater Stewart's inquiry into the British Council; whether it resulted from the Public Accounts Committee's comments on the Council's overspending two years ago and implies any reflection on its work; when Sir Findlater Stewart's Report may be expected; and whether it will be laid before the House.

Mr. George Hall: Sir Findlater Stewart has been appointed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and my right hon. Friend to inquire into the work and organisation of the British Council and to recommend what the future scope of its activities should be, how its purpose can best be fulfilled and what its relationship to the Central Government should be. The question of the future status and activities of the British Council has been under discussion between the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the right hon. Member for Mitcham (Sir M. Robertson) and my right hon. Friend since the early part of this year. Sir Findlater Stewart's appointment is the result of a decision by the Cabinet in June last that a full inquiry should be held under the joint auspices of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and my right hon. Friend. This decision implied no reflection on its work and is not connected with the report of the Committee of Public Accounts on the British Council's accounts for the financial year 1942–43. Sir Findlater Stewart has not completed

his inquiry, and I am not in a position to say when he will present his Report. It is not intended that the Report should be published, but my right hon. Friend will in due course consider together with the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether a statement can be made to the House about it.

Mr. Petherick: Can the right hon. Gentleman say why it is not suggested that the Report should be laid before the House of Commons, considering that the House is very deeply interested in the work of the British Council?

Mr. Hall: The investigation is very largely a Departmental one, which is likely to assist Departments in dealing with this very important branch of the Council's work.

Mr. Petherick: Are we to understand from the right hon. Gentleman's main answer, which in other respects is satisfactory, that the main object of the inquiry is concerned with policy for the future? If so, can he maintain that that does not concern the House of Commons, but is purely Departmental?

Mr. Hall: I am concerned with the House of Commons in connection with this matter, and I have no doubt that there will be a discussion on the work of the British Council some time in the future.

Sir W. Davison: Arising out of the important statement made by the right hon. Gentleman, is it not most desirable that at an early date there should be a discussion in the House on the work of the British Council, of which many people in the country, and many Members of the House, are largely ignorant?

Mr. Hall: That is a matter which must be left for the decision of the Leader of the House.

Mr. Buchanan: If there is to be a discussion in the House, is it not as well that we should have a copy of the Report? If any intelligent discussion is to take place it is essential that the Report should be available to Members.

Mr. Hall: I can but repeat that the inquiry is almost entirely a Departmental inquiry to advise the Departments. A full statement will be made about it after


consultation between my right hon. Friend and the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Sir W. Davison: rose——

Mr. Speaker: This appears to be developing into a question on Business.

Oral Answers to Questions — BALTIC REPUBLICS (RECOGNITION)

Sir H. Williams: asked the Secretary of State of Foreign Affairs whether His Majesty's Government still recognise the Governments of the Republics of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania.

Mr. George Hall: His Majesty's Government have not recognised any Governments in the Republics of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania since the changes which occurred in June, 1940.

Sir H. Williams: As these changes are in conflict with the principles of the Atlantic Charter and our agreement with the U.S.S.R., why have we left these people in the lurch?

Mr. Hall: I do not know that it can be said that they have been left in the lurch as, since 1940, no Government in these territories has sought, or indeed been granted, recognition.

Sir H. Williams: Is not our treatment of these countries identical with the treatment of Czechoslovakia by Germany? What is the moral difference?

Mr. Petherick: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that these Baltic States were only under Russian domination for something just over 100 years? Can he give us an assurance that that which is condemned in the case of Germany will not he condoned in the case of Russia?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Arthur Greenwood: May I ask the Leader of the House what will be the Business for the week after the Recess?

The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Eden): The Business when we meet again in the New Year will be as follows:

Tuesday, 16th January—Second Reading of the Wages Councils Bill and Com-

mittee stage of the necessary Money Resolution.

Wednesday and Thursday, 17th and 18th January—Committee and, if possible, remaining stages of the Representation of the People Bill.

The Business for Friday, 19th January, will be announced later.

Mr. Greenwood: In view of the Prime Minister's statement the other day, which visualised the desirability of an early war Debate, could not an early day be kept in hand and used for that and the Business for that day be transferred to a later day in the week? What I have in mind is that perhaps, if there were to be a war Debate, it would be most advantageous that it should take place at the earliest opportunity.

Mr. Eden: I think that all my right hon. Friend referred to was the possibility of an early war Debate, and it is possible that may be required. If so, we will make the necessary re-arrangement of Business because I do not think it would be a good idea to have the Debate on the Friday.

Sir W. Davison: In view of the important statement made by the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs with regard to the British Council and of the important work which is done by this body, will my right hon. Friend consider the desirability of allowing a Debate at an early date so that both the House and the country may know more about the work of the British Council, on which at present they are very ignorant?

Mr. Eden: I am certainly not opposed to a discussion; indeed, I think it might be very useful. As regards the occasion, there might be one on the Foreign Office Estimates or on the Report of the Public Accounts Committee, but we would welcome an occasion, if one could be found.

Mr. Tree: In view of the fact that the Chicago Conference clearly indicated that the United States intend to embark on a policy of open competition, and also of the fact that the powers of the Minister for Civil Aviation are still undefined, and that, as far as I know, he has no Ministry, can the Leader of the House give us an assurance that we can have a Debate on civil aviation at an early date?

Mr. Eden: Without accepting either of my hon. Friend's reasons for a Debate


exactly as he states them, I think it is desirable that we should have a discussion upon this subject, and I know the House wants it soon. It cannot be taken in the first week, but I hope that it may be very soon after.

Sir Hugh O'Neill: Has my right hon. Friend noticed the Motion which appeared on the Paper the day before yesterday in my name and that of all the other Members of Ulster constituencies, with regard to restrictions on communications between this country and Northern Ireland; and will he consider giving time for a Debate on it some time after the House re-assembles?
[That in the opinion of this House the time has now come when the existing restrictions on travel and communication between Great Britain and Northern Ireland should be modified, with special reference to such matters as the provision of greatly increased shipping facilities; the relaxation of the rules governing the issue of travel permits, the abolition of the censorship on correspondence originating in Northern Ireland and its modification in the case of correspondence originating in Great Britain; and generally that the special disabilities suffered by the people of Northern Ireland during over five years of war should be removed at the earliest possible moment.]

Mr. Eden: I would have to look into that. I will have a word with the Home Secretary about it.

Mr. Moelwyn Hughes: Does the right hon. Gentleman contemplate giving the House an opportunity of discussing the alterations in motor taxation suggested by the Chancellor of the Exchequer the day before yesterday?

Mr. Eden: There will be an opportunity, I should imagine, in the Budget discussions.

Mr. Hughes: Surely this exceptional course of publishing, in advance of the Budget, a projected alteration in taxation, should be discussed by the House, so that the Chancellor may have the advantage of knowing the views of the House upon it?

Mr. Eden: We have had no representations about this until the present moment. I am to-day dealing with the Business

for the week after we resume, and I should not like to commit myself on the subject.

Mr. Buchanan: With regard to the possibility of a Debate on the war situation, it is too early yet to say what form the Debate will take. May I ask, therefore, that some kind of notice should be given to us? It might be on a Motion, and in that case, as it may be on the first day after the Recess, I trust that some notice will be given to Members, so that we can understand what the Motion is.

Mr. Eden: I would like to consider that through the usual channels, but, as I explained, all my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said was that a Debate was a possibility and that he thought it fair to warn the House. I cannot go beyond that, and it is impossible to tell what the situation will be at the time of our return.

Mr. Greenwood: May I put another point to the Leader of the House, seeing that we are rising to-day? My hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Mr. Cocks) made a suggestion a little earlier which I should like to reinforce by asking my right hon. Friend whether he will use all his good offices to see whether a Christmas truce can be introduced in Greece, as perhaps one way of assisting matters?

Mr. Eden: I did make a fairly full statement of the Government's view on this matter yesterday, and I hope I made it clear to the House and to all in Greece that it is our desire that this business should be brought to a speedy conclusion. That is the position of His Majesty's Government, on that position we stand, and by that position we must hold.

Mr. Cocks: That is another aspect altogether, and has nothing to do with the position in reference to Christmas.

Mr. Speaker: We are not discussing the Greek situation now, but are on a question of Business.

Mr. Cocks: Could I ask the Leader of the House, as he made an answer, whether he will seriously consider the suggestion I made?

Mr. Eden: Our object in this war is not to stop it for a week but to obtain a final solution. With that purpose in view I


made a number of statements in the House yesterday which have been transmitted to Greece, and I hope those statements will have the effect desired. I really cannot say more than that now.

AUXILIARY TERRITORIAL SERVICE (OVERSEAS POSTING)

The Secretary of State for War (Sir James Grigg): With the permission of the House, I would like to make a statement in regard to an alteration in Government policy on the posting of members of the A.T.S. which has just been decided upon.
In this stage of the war it is more than ever necessary that we should make the best possible use of our available manpower in the Services and in industry. In the Services the chief aim is to ensure that the maximum number of men are released for operational duties and in order to effect this completely men are replaced by women wherever the nature of the work permits. The A.T.S. have given great assistance in this way at home and now the time has come when their services are urgently required overseas to release able-bodied soldiers from the kind of duty which they can perform. Some A.T.S. auxiliaries are already serving overseas but substantially increased numbers are now required. The Government have, therefore, decided to post certain A.T.S. auxiliaries, as required, overseas and are confident that this decisoin will be welcomed as a necessary and expansive deployment of available resources. The Government have, however, decided not to post auxiliaries to India except as volunteers. It is not proposed to send A.T.S. to Burma, or West Africa, either compulsorily or as volunteers.
As heretofore, volunteers will be welcomed and encouraged, and priority will be given to them in the compilation of overseas drafts. The conditions governing the acceptance of A.T.S. volunteers for overseas service are that the auxiliary must be recommended by an A.T.S. officer not below the rank of Senior Commander, and must be of the requisite medical category. Volunteers are not accepted if they are under 19 years of age, or if they have children under the age of 14. Apart from those who volunteer, no member of the A.T.S. will be posted overseas to any theatre unless she

is 21 years of age or over, unmarried and medically fit for service abroad.
Accommodation for A.T.S. auxiliaries overseas will be of the best possible standard. In winter they will be accommodated in huts or billets; in the summer months tents may be used, but certainly not in winter. The Government recognise the need for welfare amenities and recreational facilities on a generous scale and the utmost care will be used to make every possible provision. The A.T.S. overseas will receive the same medical attention as at home including their own women doctors and accommodation in their own special wards. They will be eligible for leave on exactly the same terms as soldiers.
The work which A.T.S. overseas will be doing will be similar to that which they have performed, with such success, at home; in particular, signal personnel and clerks are required. The majority will be employed at the larger headquarters and installations in the rearward areas which may of course at any time come under the same kind of bombardment as London. Here their work will be invaluable. The mixed batteries of anti-aircraft artillery and other associated formations will be strictly confined to volunteers, and will of course be employed in any circumstances or stations in which the High Command may require them.
The Government know that the A.T.S. on whose services so many calls have been made, will welcome these opportunities of making a further vital contribution to the war effort, a contribution on which will depend in no small degree the maintenance of Britain's war strength in the successful and unrelenting prosecution of the war.

Sir P. Harris: Could the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance to the House that the members of the A.T.S. will be kept well behind the battle zone?

Sir J. Grigg: That is included in my statement. I thought I made that quite clear.

Mr. Ellis Smith: In view of the great contribution made by our country relative to that of other countries, is not this step going a little too far, and will my right hon. Friend consider fixing the age of the girls who will come under this scheme at 21 rather than 19?

Sir J. Grigg: I thought I had made it clear that the age would be fixed at 21 for those who are posted. The age for volunteers will be 19, as at present.

Mr. Ellis Smith: I understood that, but what I am asking about is the volunteers. Will my right hon. Friend consider whether the age for volunteers should not also be fixed at 21?

Sir J. Grigg: I should be very loath to do that, because I am sure it would create the greatest possible disappointment among the girls themselves.

Mr. Turton: In view of this great extension of the Service will my right hon. Friend consider the relaxation of the rule that prevents a wife serving in the same theatre of operations as her husband?

Sir J. Grigg: I will certainly consider that, but I am bound to say that my first reaction to that suggestion is one of opposition. I can imagine nothing worse than the added anxiety for either spouse if they were together in circumstances of possible danger.

Miss Rathbone: While my right hon. Friend is considering the question of women serving in the same theatre of operations as their husbands, will he remember that in India distances are so vast that a woman could only see her husband once or twice a year, but all the same she would like to be near him; and, further, in reference to what was stated by another questioner, does my right hon. Friend recognise that women are quite as willing to take risks to life in the service of their country as men and, should be allowed to do so?

Dr. Edith Summerskill: In view of the fact that women are going to have more responsibility in this war and are going to replace men, are the Government considering paying them at the same rate?

Sir J. Grigg: In this particular connection and its relation to any other sphere of women's employment, No, Sir.

Mr. J. J. Lawson: In view of this very grave departure from the usual practice, will the Government make arrangements for a discussion upon this matter, as there are quite a number of questions that one wants to ask which could not be answered off-hand this morning?

Sir J. Grigg: I do not think it is a very grave departure, because at any rate in the case of the W.R.N.S. they are already posted abroad. It is not a very great departure, because the practice is already in existence. "Wrens" are posted abroad as well as going abroad as volunteers. I made my statement this morning in order to cover as many of the points as possible and there will be opportunities for hon. Members to raise the subject, but the question asked by my learned Friend should be addressed to the Leader of the House.

Mr. J. J. Lawson: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that where A.T.S. are in mixed batteries serving overseas they are on very real active service, and there are a good many questions about that side of it?

Sir J. Grigg: Yes, Sir, the A.T.S. go overseas in mixed batteries, but purely as volunteers. There is no question of compulsion.

Sir Patrick Hannon: Will officers and members of the A.T.S. serving overseas have the same facilities for leave and the same consideration in that respect?

Sir J. Grigg: Assuredly.

Mr. John Dugdale: Is it correct to say that we are the only one among the United Nations who are posting women compulsorily overseas? I take no exception to it, but I just want to know.

Sir J. Grigg: I would rather like to have notice of that Question. I cannot answer it off-hand.

Sir Herbert Williams: Will the right hon. Gentleman say under what statutory authority he is acting in this matter?

Sir J. Grigg: I imagine under the regulations which apply to the Forces of the Crown, of which the A.T.S. form part.

Sir H. Williams: I want to know under which Act of Parliament.

Sir J. Grigg: The Army and Air Force Annual Act.

Mr. Guy: I wish to ask whether India is included in this announcement, and, if so, will the right hon. Gentleman see that conditions there are considerably improved before the A.T.S. are sent there?

Sir J. Grigg: I thought I had made it clear that in the case of India only volunteers will be sent.

Captain Plugge: May I ask whether, when they are off duty, there will be no opposition to officers walking out with privates in the A.T.S.?

Mr. A. Bevan: Does the right hon. Gentleman intend to act upon this announcement before the House has had an opportunity of discussing it?

Sir J. Grigg: That was the intention, and it seems to me that it will be in accordance with the general view of the House. That was the intention of the Government and that is why I made the statement.

Mr. Bevan: Is it not a very serious matter to make a statement like this in this manner just before the Christmas Recess? Will the right hon. Gentleman not reconsider the question of taking any action upon this decision until the House has had an opportunity of considering all its implications when we return?

Sir J. Grigg: I think the hon. Member is exaggerating the nature and magnitude of the departure from precedent, because for months past, and I think it may be for years, "Wrens" have been posted abroad.

Mr. J. J. Lawson: While there is no doubt that large numbers of the A.T.S. will volunteer for service—I have no doubt about that—surely the right hon. Gentleman is not going to say that it was within the general grasp of the mind of the average mother or father that their girls were conscripted to go, as I take it, to the Continent? That is a very serious departure. Before he puts this decision into practice the right hon. Gentleman ought to give the House a chance of discussing it, so that if this action is taken it will be with general good will, because I can assure him if there is not some discussion upon this matter before action is taken then that fact in itself will cause great dissatisfaction.

Sir J. Grigg: I will certainly consider whether it is necessary to send any of them abroad before the House reassembles, which is only a matter of two or three weeks, but at the same time I would not like to leave the House under any misapprehension. There is very urgent need for these girls abroad, need

for girls who cannot be found from among the ranks of the volunteers.

Mr. Cocks: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the W.R.N.S. is a voluntary service and that anyone can leave it?

Mr. Buchanan: Is the Secretary of State for War aware that when conscription for women was introduced the Minister in charge gave certain definite pledges that the Act would not apply in certain categories such as having to go abroad? That was one of the definite statements made in that House and until to-day it has never been withdrawn by the Government. In view of the fact that this means going back on a definite pledge given by the Government will he not consider deferring the matter until the House has had some opportunity of expressing an opinion?

Sir J. Grigg: I have looked up the statement. It was a statement on current practice, as far as my recollection of it goes, and there was not an assurance that it would hold for all time. As I have said, I will certainly consider not sending them abroad compulsorily before the House reassembles and I hope hon. Members will leave that so for the time being.

Mr. J. Griffiths: In view of the fact that these young women and their parents were under the definite impression when they were conscripted that their services would only be used in this country, will the right hon. Gentleman give an undertaking to hon. Members before we go to our constituencies that no girls will be posted abroad until we come back?

Sir J. Grigg: I will certainly give the assurance that no girls will be posted abroad compulsorily until we come back, but in saying that I want to leave the House under no misapprehension. These girls are urgently required and this postponement will in itself represent a definite diminution of the effort we can put forward.

Mr. Arthur Greenwood: Now that my right hon. Friend has given this undertaking to the House, may I ask the Leader of the House to say that early arrangements will be made for the matter to be threshed out in this Chamber as soon as possible?

Mr. Eden: I think that is desirable, but I do not want any misunderstand-


ing. The announcement my right hon. Friend made this morning was one which was carefully considered by the War Cabinet before he made it, and I can assure the House it was made only after deep reflection by all my colleagues, because we felt it was absolutely necessary to do it. I agree that it is desirable that the House should express itself upon it. I could not give an assurance that nobody will be sent overseas compulsorily until we come back, but we will try to arrange for an early discussion of the subject.

Miss Ward: While not disagreeing at all with the Government policy I should like to ask my right hon. Friend whether the Women's Consultative Committee of the Ministry of Labour were consulted, in view of the fact that in the past we have been consulted on very many matters?

Sir J. Grigg: I certainly consulted my colleague the Minister of Labour at every stage.

Miss Ward: But the Women's Consultative Committee?

Mr. Woodburn: The W.A.A.F. have not been mentioned, and may I ask whether they are also included?

Sir J. Grigg: As far as I know at the moment, No, but I am not entitled to speak for the Royal Air Force.

Lady Apsley: Further to the announcement made by my right hon. Friend, which I know will give great pleasure and satisfaction to the great majority of all ranks of the A.T.S.—that they shall be given this opportunity for rendering further service to their country in the hour of need—may I ask whether he will give attention to the very general request that the A.T.S. shall be made a permanent part of the Army?

Sir J. Grigg: I share the Noble Lady's view as to the general feeling among all ranks of the A.T.S., but the second question she asked does not seem to me to arise out of this general discussion.

Captain Duncan: May I ask whether the main object of this scheme is to increase the chances of leave and the repatriation of men, or is it to increase the build-up in the theatres of war overseas?

Sir J. Grigg: The main object of it is to release for more active operational duties—combatant duties—men who are at present doing work well behind the lines.

Mr. De la Bère: Why cannot it be done voluntarily? Why is it compulsory? That is the objectionable part—sending women overseas against their will.

Mr. Driberg: Could the Secretary of State answer the point put to him by the hon. Member for the Combined English Universities (Miss Rathbone) about the service of husband and wife in the same theatre of war when that theatre is India?

Sir J. Grigg: I did answer.

Mr. Driberg: No, excuse me, the right hon. Gentleman did not.

Sir J. Grigg: I said that I would consider it, but that I approached it with a prejudice against it.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS

That they have agreed to Consolidated Fund (No. 1) Bill, without Amendment.

PALACE OF WESTMINSTER (ACCOMMODATION)

That they have appointed a Committee consisting of seven Lords to join with a Committee of the Commons to inquire into the accommodation in the Palace of Westminster, and to report thereon with such recommendations as appear to them desirable, pursuant to the Commons Message of Monday last; and that they propose that the Joint Committee do meet in Committee Room 3 on Tuesday, the 23rd of January next, at half-past Two o'clock.

PALACE OF WESTMINSTER (ACCOMMODATION)

So much of the Lords Message as relates to the place and time of meeting of the Joint Committee considered:

Committee appointed by this House to meet the Lords Committee as proposed by their Lordships.—[Major Sir James Edmondson.]

Message to the Lords to acquaint them therewith.

ECCLESIASTICAL COMMITTEE

In pursuance of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919 (9 & 10 Geo. V, c. 76, s. 2 (2)), Mr. SPEAKER has nominated Ronw Moelwyn Hughes,


Esq., K.C., and Lieut.-Colonel Dennis Coleridge Boles to serve for the duration of the present Parliament upon the Ecclesiastical Committee, in the room of Charles George Ammon, Esq., called to the House of Peers, and the Hon. Richard Douglas Denman, resigned.

RAILWAYS (CONTROL AGREEMENT)

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. James Stuart.]

12.30 p.m.

Sir Hugh O'Neill: On this occasion, the Adjournment for the Christmas Recess, I desire to raise the question of the terms under which the railways are being operated by the Government as controlled undertakings. I am raising this question on behalf of a group of Members of this House who are interested in the railways and those who own railway securities, the proprietors or stockholders. Perhaps I should say that the group which I represent does not include any Members of this House who are directors of railways. They, I understand, have their separate Committee, and I am in no way speaking on their behalf. There are, I believe, well over a million persons who hold railway securities of different kinds, and railway securities form the largest aggregate of capital of any British industry. The majority of the holders of these securities are comparatively small people who hold comparatively small amounts.
The existing Control Agreement has operated from 1st January, 1941. This superseded a former Agreement which was in force for the first 16 months of the war. I should like, for a moment or two, to remind the House of the history of railway control during the war. The railways were taken over on 1st September, 1939, and the financial arrangements were published as a White Paper in February, 1940. The main terms of the first financial arrangement were (1) the revenue receipts and expenditure were to be pooled, (2) the average of the net revenues for the years 1935, 1936 and 1937 were to be guaranteed by the Government and paid over to the railways—this guaranteed sum was estimated to be somewhere about £40,000,000—and (3) any further balance of net revenue in the pool, up to £3,500,000, was to be paid to the railways. Then comes paragraph 4 of the first Agreement, which I should like to read to the House in order to remind them of what it says. It says:
If the net revenue in the pool exceeds … £43,500,000 then, until the sum paid to them"—
that is, the railways—
reaches £56,000,000, being the estimated sum required to bring the net revenues of the

controlled undertakings up to their standard revenues, one half of the excess over £43,500,000 will be paid to the Exchequer and the other half will be paid to the controlled undertakings … so that in any case the total net revenue accruing to a controlled undertaking shall not exceed its standard revenue.
Any balance of net revenue left in the pool was to be paid to the Exchequer. There were one or two further points in this first Agreement to which I would like to refer. There was provision for maintenance and renewals. It was provided that the cost of war damage, up to £10,000,000 in any full year, was to be charged to revenue expenditure. It was provided that freight charges were to be adjusted to meet working costs, and, then, paragraph 11 said:
The Minister of Transport or the railway companies … may, after the end of the year 1940, propose revision of these arrangements for any cause of a major character and, if agreed, the arrangements shall be revised accordingly.
This first Agreement was the result of long negotiations dating back, I believe, to a very considerable time before the war, and in anticipation of the possible outbreak of war. It bore the stamp, in my view, of free negotiation and it amounted, in effect, to a partnership between the railways and the State.
In the course of the year 1941, the Government decided to take advantage of paragraph 11 of that Agreement, and they gave notice that they desired its revision for a cause of a major character. As a matter of fact, they gave two causes for revision. The first reason they gave was their decision to introduce legislation placing all public utilities on the same basis as regards war damage, and their second reason was their announced policy of minimising the impact of increased costs of transport upon prices of essential goods and services. In other words, they decided to employ a policy of subsidising the cost of living—in this case transport—as we know has been carried out in many other directions.
These negotiations resulted in a second Agreement being concluded which was presented to Parliament in a White Paper in September, 1941, and discussed in this House on 22nd October, 1941. This second Agreement swept away all the paragraphs of the old one savouring of a partnership, and, in their place, it provided for a guaranteed rental to be paid to the railways of £43,000,000—in round figures—the whole of any excess in the


pool over that amount going to the Government. There were paragraphs dealing with the provision of sums to cover maintenance and renewals and abnormal wear and tear, but that is really all there is to the second Agreement—a rental, and the whole of the balance going to the Government.
The Government must have thought, when they made this Agreement, that it was a pretty good bargain at the time, but it has worked out tar more profitably for them than they could ever have imagined. In the three years 1941, 1942 and 1943, the Government received just under £130,000,000 in excess of the guaranteed rental. The proprietors of the railways feel that they have had a pretty unfair bargain. The principle of partnership has been abolished, the Government now appropriate the whole of what I may call the equity, and there are at present £78,000,000 worth of London and North Eastern Railway Ordinary Stock which is receiving no dividend at all, and something over £60,000,000 of London and North Eastern Railway Second Preference Stock which is receiving just 2⅝ per cent. in place of the full 4 per cent. to which, in my view, it should be entitled. The London and North Eastern Railway are very particularly affected and badly hit by this existing Agreement because, during the years before the war, as we well remember, so many of the areas in this country which they served were subject to very special depression. They were the depressed areas, the special areas, and so on.
To bring the story of railway control up to date, I must tell the House that at the annual meetings of the various railway companies at the beginning of this year, 1944, resolutions were passed by the shareholders complaining of the injustice, in their view, of the present control arrangements, and they asked their directors to convey these resolutions to the Government and to try, if possible, to secure a revision of the Agreement. As a result of that, the Railway Companies Association wrote to the Minister of Transport asking for revision of the Agreement for two causes of a major character not contemplated when the negotiations took place. These two causes were, first, our declaration of war on Japan and, second, the entry of the United States

into war with Germany. These factors, particularly the second, meant an immense expansion of the work of the railways in this country and an enormous amount of traffic, both passenger and goods, which could never have been contemplated at the time the existing Agreement was concluded, which was, of course, before either Japan or the United States had come into the war.
The Minister of Transport would not agree to any revision of the present Agreement, and that is how the matter stands at the present time. In my view, the reasons put forward by the Railway Companies Association why this Agreement should be revised were very potent and pregnant reasons, whereas neither of the contingencies which the Government feared in terminating the first Agreement has materialised. The bomb damage which has actually happened would have been easily taken care of by the terms of the first Agreement, and there has been no rise in transport costs since 1941, and the Government have not had to subsidise transport in any way since that year. Not only have they not had to subsidise transport, but they have received a subsidy, if I may so call it, from the railway companies, as I mentioned a short time ago, of £130,000,000.
So much for the present situation with regard to railway control. I would like to refer to one or two points which were made by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport, when he was replying to a Debate on this matter on the Adjournment on 1st August last. The matter was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Sir J. Mellor). Unfortunately, there was only half an hour for that Debate, and my hon. Friend was not able to conclude his speech. He did, however, make the following point in justifying the present Agreement. He said that nobody should make profits out of the war, least of all the railways. I entirely agree with that, but Parliament has laid down, in its wisdom, regular statutory machinery for preventing people making excessive profits out of the war. We have established an Excess Profits Tax, and under the regulations governing Excess Profits Tax it is provided that where businesses have had very low profits—unduly low profits—in the years immediately preceding the war,


they can put forward a substituted standard, which is based on the interest on their capital, which shall be the standard above which they must pay over excess profits, and below which they can keep those profits. Why is it that, among all the businesses of this great commercial country, the only kind of enterprise, so far as I know, which has been singled out for this specially harsh treatment is the railways? They have not been allowed to come under the ordinary statutory provisions Which relate to those who have made high profits, or excess profits, out of the war.
The Parliamentary Secretary said, in the course of the speech to which I have referred, that a great public service like this was different from an ordinary munitions business. In some respects, of course, it is different, but, so far as I know, other statutory undertakings, such as gas companies and electricity companies, and controlled businesses such as shipping companies, all come under the ordinary law with regard to excess profits and have not been adversely differentiated against in this way, as have the railways. There is, of course, a difference; the profits of public utility companies or statutory undertakings are very drastically controlled already, but while the Government control their profits and therefore make it practically impossible—and quite rightly—for them to earn high excess profits, the Government have always encouraged them to be in a position to pay reasonable interest on the capital employed in those industries. In my contention, that has not been the case with regard to the railways.
There are two other points on this question of Excess Profits Tax that I should like to make, to show where the railways are further prejudiced. Under excess profits law, there is to be a refund after the war of 20 per cent. of the amount paid by businesses in excess profits. That will not, I presume, apply to the railways, because they have not been allowed to come under excess profits law. There are also provisions for repayment of duty if there have been deficiencies, but in so far as it might operate, it, too, will not be available for the railways. Another point that my hon. Friend made was with regard to the question of the standard revenue, to which I have already referred, because it was dealt with in the first

Agreement which was concluded at the beginning of the war. He rather scoffed at this question of standard revenue and treated it very lightly. He said it was based on the best year the railways ever had in recent times, the year 1913. He said that it was 31 years old. He gave the House an impression that the standard revenue was not a matter of any great importance and should not be emphasised at all strongly.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of War Transport (Mr. Noel-Baker): If I might interrupt my right hon. Friend, may I say that I am moderately confident, without looking up what I said, that I arrived at the conclusion that my noble Friend could not possibly have taken the standard revenue as the basis on which he made the Agreement?

Sir H. O'Neill: I was not really dealing with that point. I have read my hon. Friend's speech very carefully and I thought he did definitely deal with this question of the standard revenue rather lightly. I would remind the House that the standard revenue which the railways are allowed under the Act of 1921 is still the law of the land. Not only so, but the first Agreement, concluded in 1940, after the outbreak of the war was based upon that standard revenue. I have read out Article 4 under which the railways were to be partners with the State until they reached their standard revenue. That standard revenue has actually been attained since by the railways, and the revenues are now enormously in excess of it.
There is one other point as regards standard revenue which the House ought to remember. It is true that it is based on the year 1913, but we ought not to forget that, in 1913, the £ sterling was worth just about double what it is worth to-day. If the permitted standard revenue of the railways has anything to do with the kind of remuneration which the stockholders ought to receive, one would think that, if anything, the standard revenue ought to be higher. I do not make any great point of it but I am merely pointing out that the sterling was worth very much more in 1913.

Mr. Noel-Baker: What was the level of wages?

Sir H. O'Neill: It was certainly very much lower.
The other point which he made was that the rental of £43,000,000 in round figures is far better than the maximum pre-war revenues of the railway companies. That obviously is a fact which cannot be disputed. Figures show it, but I would remind the Govvernment that the great slump which the railways were experiencing for many years before the outbreak of this war was mainly due to the tremendous competition of road transport. That increase of road transport competition had been evident for at least 15, and even 20, years before the outbreak of this war. Though many promises were made by various Governments during the pre-war years, nothing was ever done about it. Governments admitted that the railway companies had a very strong case. Their plight and their low revenues before the outbreak of this war were therefore due to a very considerable extent to Government inaction and Government procrastination on this question of a fair system of rates and fares as between road transport and railways.
Therefore, when my hon. Friend says that the rental now being paid to the railways by the Government is larger than the average of the immediately pre-war years, my answer is that the low revenues of the immediately pre-war years must largely be placed at the door of the Governments of the day—not the present Government—who did not take up this matter with the strength and purpose which it deserved. I hope that I have said enough to show that the proprietors of the railways have good cause for just complaint and that, in justice and in equity, they have a strong case for asking for a revision of the present Agreement.
Before I conclude I should like lo ask my hon. Friend one or two questions. Article 11 of the existing, the second, Agreement says—a previous Article had dealt with maintenance and renewals—
No other charge shall be allowed in respect of the said items of maintenance except so far as the Minister, in respect of wear and tear which is shown by the undertaking to be abnormal as compared with the base period, may agree to its inclusion.
In a letter which the Minister of Transport wrote to the Railway Companies' Association on 16th June, he stated that the Government were prepared to consider this question of abnormal wear and tear with the railway companies, and I believe

they have been in negotiation since then upon this matter. If my hon. Friend has any information to give the House in regard to how those negotiations are proceeding, I am sure that Members would be glad to have it.
The other point about which I should specially like to ask my hon. Friend is the period during which control is to operate. Article 33 of the present Agreement says:
Control will be continued for a minimum period of one year after the cessation of hostilities. Before control comes to an end"—
that is, in regard to statutory rights and obligations—
time will be given for the operation of any statutory machinery governing the level of charges.

Mr. Moelwyn Hughes: May I ask which Article the right hon. Gentleman is reading?

Sir H. O'Neill: I am reading paragraph 33 of the existing Agreement of 1941. Apparently, control is to last until "the cessation of hostilities." Exactly what that means we cannot say. I imagine it will have to be defined by Parliament, whether it means hostilities with Germany or the end of the war as a whole. Anyhow, this provision of time will be given for settling rates and charges and it is a very essential point indeed. When the time comes to settle rates and charges I most strongly suggest that both road and rail should be included and that the opportunity should be taken which, as I have said, was missed before the war, to bring about some general settlement as between road transport and rail transport. Without that, I do not see how the future can be anything but dark and difficult.
Whatever the future structure of transport in this country is to be after the war—and it can hardly be the same as it was before—it is of paramount importance that our transport undertakings should be handed over to whoever is to manage and operate them, in a condition in which they will be able to stand on their own feet as prosperous concerns, which will conduct efficient service and provide a reasonable return on their capital, neither receiving subsidies nor paying large revenues to the State at the cost of the ordinary citizen. If the war has proved anything, it has proved that the railways are an absolutely essential service, strategically and in every other way. They have done splendid


work in the face of almost overwhelming difficulties. The management has been efficient, and railway workers, both men and women, have been magnificent. All have faced dangers and hardships with courage and endurance. In view of that fact, I can say with confidence that railway transport deserves the brightest future which the country can give it.

12.59 p.m.

Mr. Silkin: My right hon. Friend who has just spoken, and his associates, are certainly persistent. This same question was raised on the Adjournment Motion last August. I hope it is not going to become a habit of my right hon. Friend and his friends to raise this question on every possible occasion. He stated, at somewhat greater length, the argument which the hon. Member for Tamworth (Sir J. Mellor) put forward last August for the revision of the Agreement. I do not think that the answer will be very different. I have taken a very great interest in the various railway agreements ever since the war, and I should like to say a few words about the original Agreement with which my right hon. Friend dealt at the outset of his remarks and which he regards apparently with longing and affection.
The House will remember that there was very considerable criticism of the original Agreement. It was felt by many that it was grossly unfair to the general public. Among other things, it enabled the railway companies to increase fares if their expenditure increased, even though, at the same time, their revenue also increased. It permitted the railway companies to earn a grossly inflated revenue, even though the bulk of their traffic was Government traffic, brought about by the exigencies of the war. No one spoke in stronger terms about this agreement than the present Home Secretary, and in March, 1941, there was a Debate on the Agreement, one of many, in which I had the privilege of taking part. Looking back on what I said then, I believe I was justified in saying that the Agreement was one which ought to be revised without delay. In reply to my speech, the then Minister of Transport, Lord Brabazon, said the more he looked at this Agreement the less he liked it. Therefore, the House was not surprised when, shortly afterwards, a new Agreement was entered into. This

new Agreement, the one which is the subject of the present discussion, was freely negotiated. No pressure whatever was put upon the railway companies, although a suggestion has been made to that effect, but it was quite rightly repudiated by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of War Transport last August.
May I draw the attention of the House to paragraph (2) of the outline of the revised financial arrangement in which it is stated:
The Government and the four amalgamated railways and the London Passenger Transport Board have agreed that the existing financial arrangements should be modified and, as a result of negotiations, the arrangements have been revised.
There has never been a suggestion from any responsible quarter since then that this Agreement was not freely negotiated, and that it was not, at the time it was made, a fair and reasonable Agreement. My right hon. Friend said that new circimstances had arisen which, although there was no provision in the revised Agreement for further revision, justified a revision on moral grounds. The points he made were that since the Agreement was made America had entered into the war and we had made war against Japan. But I would like to draw attention to the observations of the hon. Member for Bolton (Sir C. Entwistle) at the last annual general meeting at the Great Western Railway Company. The hon. Member is the Deputy Chairman of the company, and the question of the revision of the Agreement was raised at that annual general meeting. This is what he said:
My own personal view"—
and I would suggest that the personal view of the hon. Member is of more importance than the personal view of other hon. Members, even though they may be members of an organisation—
is that any approach to the Government now for revision would be premature, and contrary to the spirit in which we accepted that agreement.
At the time when the Deputy Chairman of the Great Western Railway made those remarks, we were already at war with Japan, and the United States had already entered the war. Those facts were no doubt well within the knowledge of the Deputy Chairman of the Great Western Railway. Obviously, therefore, he did not consider those facts justified the


revision of the Agreement. In fact he said he thought that
any approach to the Government now for revision would be premature.
The House will, I am sure, accept the views of the Deputy Chairman of the Great Western Railway rather than, with great respect, the views of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Antrim (Sir H. O'Neill).

Sir H. O'Neill: May I point out that the directors did approach the Government for a revision very shortly afterwards?

Mr. Silkin: Yes, I am very well aware of that. I should disclose that I have a personal interest. I have shares in the Great Western Railway. I agree that some shareholders thought that approaches should be made, and like a good democrat the hon. Member for Bolton accepted the view of the shareholders and made an approach. I am saying what his own personal views are, and I think they are of some importance.
Is the Agreement unfair? I suggest it is not only unfair, but, as I remarked at the time when it was made, it is very generous to the railway companies. My right hon. Friend brushed on one side the fact that it gives to the railway companies considerably higher revenue than their average earnings for the previous ten years. Having gone into the figures I would suggest it gave them a considerably higher revenue than their average revenue for the previous 20 years. On possibly no more than one or two occasions since the last war have the railway companies earned as much as £43,000,000, which is their present revenue. I agree that difficulties have arisen because of conflict with the roads, but I would respectfully suggest to my right hon. Friend that that is a factor one cannot get away from, and no action of the Government, short of a subsidy, could have given the railway companies a greater revenue. After all, they were entitled to go to the Railway Rates Tribunal before the war and ask for higher rates, since they were not earning the standard revenue provided under the 1921 Act. Why did they not go? I submit to the House they did not go to the Tribunal because they were aware of the law of diminishing returns, that if the fares and rates were increased it would not necessarily mean an increase in their

net revenue, but might mean the reverse, because fares and rates were already sufficiently high. The railway companies were well aware of that, and did not make any application to the Railway Rates Tribunal, though the 1921 Act would have permitted them to do so as they were not earning the standard revenue.
I submit to the House that the Agreement was not only fair, but even generous. My right hon. Friend referred to the London and North Eastern stock, some of which was not receiving a dividend, but which, in fact, has not received a dividend for many years. There is no reason why, because the Government require the use of the railways through war circumstances, because the nation requires the use of the railways, stocks which had for many years not received a dividend, should suddenly receive one. I cannot see the equity of that. But in fact my right hon. Friend also quoted the preference stock which was to-day receiving a mere 2⅝ per cent. But one can buy the stock on the Stock Exchange at the present moment at a price which will give one 8 per cent., not 2⅝ per cent. dividend. But that stock before the war was only receiving a fraction of 1 per cent., and I would submit that they have done very well indeed to be now getting 2⅝ per cent. against a fraction of 1 per cent. If one takes what the Stock Exchange thinks about the Railway Agreement, it is a fact that many of the stocks have doubled in their quotations since the Agreement was made. That shows what the public really thinks about the Railway Agreement.
I submit that my right hon. Friend has made no case for an upward revision of the Agreement in favour of the railway companies. If anything, though I do not press the point, there might be a case for a revision downwards. It is true that the Government have done very well out of this Agreement, but after all the Government are the biggest customers of the railways at this time, and the charges made for railway traffic are purely arbitrary. I suggest that by varying very slightly the charges which the railways make at the present time for Government traffic, these big profits could be converted, into a loss. After all, these profits are being made very largely at the expense of the traveling


public, because the travelling public are not getting the comfort and convenience for the fares they pay, and which they are entitled to expect; and if the profits are high it is not the railway companies which should receive more. There might be a case for a rebate for the travelling public. I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will be firm, and give no hope to my right hon. Friend of any upward revision in the Railway Agreement. On the contrary I hope he will look into the matter and see if something more can be done for the travelling public.

1.12 p.m.

Sir Alfred Beit: I must say that I find myself in a very large measure of agreement with what the hon. Member for Peckham (Mr. Silkin) has just said. I ask myself what purpose my right hon. Friend thought he might be serving in raising this matter again to-day. I feel absolutely certain that he is really aware of the fact that he is beating against a door which is not only closed, but barred and bolted. I believe that quite a number of approaches have been made to the Ministry of War Transport for a revision of this Agreement, and from what I have been able to ascertain I should have thought that the answers given to those approaches would have left my right hon. Friend in no doubt that he was not likely to get any of the advantages he claims.
I wish to look into the assumptions he made, and see what was in his mind, and what he thought he might be able to get. The first assumption was his argument that if the railways had been treated as other companies had been for Excess Profits Tax, they would have had a more advantageous position than in point of fact has been the case. I think that is a very broad assumption, and one with which it is difficult to agree. In the first place my right hon. Friend said that had they been treated in the normal manner their standard revenue would probably have been taken as the revenue for the standard period. I do not think there is any evidence to show that would have been the case. It seems much more likely that the revenue for the three preceding years would have been taken, and that is the revenue on which the present Agreement is based. He said there was a special claim in view of the particular effects of road competition, but though that is an undeniable factor it is very

largely hypothetical, and would be impossible to measure in terms of pounds, shillings and pence. I do not think he is correct in his assumption that a higher or substituted standard would in fact have been accepted for the railways had the normal procedure regarding E.P.T. been adopted in their particular case.

Sir John Mellor: Does my hon. Friend appreciate that the substituted standard is based on an assessment of capital, not revenue.

Sir A. Beit: Yes, but the railways' standard revenue is very much the same as the return on capital to which my hon. Friend referred in his interruption. I am quite certain there would not have been sufficiently strong grounds to be able to convince the Inland Revenue that a different standard than the earnings prior to the war should have been taken had the railways been on the ordinary E.P.T. basis. Another point which escaped my right hon. Friend's observation, which I think must be kept in mind, is that the railways, under the existing Agreement, are in point of fact enjoying terms that are advantageous to them regarding their renewals. If the railway companies had been treated for E.P.T. in the same way as other companies, they would have been allowed only to put aside money for renewals based on the cost of the articles—rolling stock, rails, and the like—at the time they were purchased. At present the railways are enabled to base their renewals fund upon the cost of replacement, which is in most cases 50 per cent. above pre-war cost. I think that that advantage would largely set off the ultimate refund after the war of 20 per cent.—less Income Tax of course—which they might otherwise have enjoyed. I have attempted to dispose of the argument that they would have been more fairly treated, or would have gained financially, if looked upon as ordinary companies.
The second point that my right hon. Friend referred to—and it was referred to by the hon. Member for Peckham—is the special case of these L.N.E.R. stocks. It is right to point out that they amount to £78,000,000 out of a total railway investment of £1,100,000,000—a very small proportion of the whole. Even if the railways were allowed by the Government to enjoy a higher amount than £43,000,000 it could not in any way be right that that balance should go to the L.N.E.R. If


the companies were allowed to retain a larger amount that additional balance would have to be divided equitably between the four companies, according to an agreed scheme. I think that a very great increase on the £4,000,000 would have to be guaranteed to cover this deficiency of £78,000,000 on L.N.E.R. stock. It seems to me that unless the L.N.E.R. were themselves in a position to earn very much more, they could not establish a claim to a larger share than the present agreed quota between the four railway companies.
There is one point on which I support what my right hon. Friend said, and I hope that the Minister will be able to say something about this matter—I hope that he will forgive me if I am not able to be in my place to hear his reply. I am referring to the question of costs. We were told that the second Railway Agreement, which stabilised the position and did not allow any sliding scale to the companies in the share of profits, was made because the Government said at the time that it was their intention to control prices and, as far as possible, to avoid any rise in prices. They have done a great deal in that direction, and very large subsidies are paid to maintain price levels. But it has not operated all in one direction. The railway companies have had to pay something like 100 per cent. increase in the cost of coal since the outbreak of the war, and almost as great an increase since the second Agreement was made. I would ask my hon. Friend if he could say something to justify the statement, which was made at the time of the second Agreement, that the object of fixing the share of the profits to the railway companies was to prevent any rise in costs. Otherwise I entirely agree with the hon. Member for Peckham. There could be no question, I think, in the mind of the House, or in that of the country, that, after what has happened in the last two years, there is no likelihood of a revision being granted at the present stage; and I think that the quotations of railway stock on the Stock Exchange make it amply clear that the position is regarded, by the public as being absolutely satisfactory at the present time.

1.20 p.m.

Mr. Moelwyn Hughes: As the hon. Member for South-East St.

Pancras (Sir A. Beit) said, the capital value of the railway companies as a whole amounts to something over £1,000,000,000. That £1,000,000,000 contains some "water," and part of it represents a number of assets which have ceased to possess any value at all, as hon. Members will remember, from a recent correspondence in the columns of "The Times," initiated by the hon. Member for Newport (Sir R. Clarry). It is not surprising, therefore, that at no time has the public valuation of this shareholding, as assessed for stock prices, been as high as its nominal value.

Sir J. Mellor: Is my hon. and learned Friend contending that the railways can now be replaced for less than the nominal value of the capital?

Mr. Hughes: I am not suggesting anything of the kind: that is not my point. My point relates to the actual capitalised value of the railways to-day.

Sir J. Mellor: My hon. and learned Friend said that there was a lot of "water" in the capital.

Mr. Hughes: Some.

Sir J. Mellor: Will he explain what he means by that statement?

Mr. Hughes: I thought my hon. Friend was a greater expert in these financial matters than I am, and that the term "water" in capital was perfectly well understood. I do not think it is necessary for me to enlighten him on a financial matter of that kind.

Sir J. Mellor: But in the case of the railways?

Mr. Hughes: I come back to the point I was making, that at no time have Stock Exchange values ever been as high as the nominal figures of the holdings. It is not surprising, therefore, that some of this capital has been drawing no interest, and some very little interest, for many years. It is a strange argument that stock which has very seldom been able to earn interest in peace-time should be able to take advantage of war to earn money. My hon. Friend the Member for Peckham (Mr. Silkin) described this Agreement as generous. Nobody has explained the exact extent of its generosity. The Agreement provides for a guaranteed £43,000,000. That is to be paid to the


railway companies as a certainty, not affected in any way by increases in costs or increases in wages, not affected by any cost of replacement; and there is more in the replacement provision than the hon. Member for South-East St. Pancras said, because the maintenance fund is replenished at the cost of replacement, assessed at the time when the money is put into the fund. It may be that if you were to build a railway engine to-day it would cost twice as much as it did before the war; but that sum is put into the maintenance fund. It is not spent now; it is invested, and retained. It may be that, after the war, when the time comes to rebuild engines, they can be rebuilt at a good deal less than the pre-war price. Therefore, the maintenance fund contains a great deal of clear profit to the railway companies.
Let us compare the £43,000,000 with the position in 1938, to see whether there is any real ground for complaint. In 1938, the last complete year before the war, the shareholders of the railway companies of this country had available for distribution £33,500,000, and it was a very uncertain figure at that. Nobody could have predicted with certainty that they could have maintained that the next year if the war had not come. They are getting to-day a certain £43,000,000, as certain as the interest of any Government security. That is sufficient, I should think, to convince the House that the term "generous," used by my hon. Friend the Member for Peckham, is amply justified.
What then is the complaint? What could have been extracted by way of revenue, if the railway companies had only been given their heads? I have no doubt they would have extracted considerably more revenue to themselves. But is that the proper approach? Supposing the attitude of getting what you can in war had been generally followed, what wages the servants of the railway companies could have extracted under present circumstances. They, like the railway stock itself, cannot be replaced in war-time. If the railway workers were to hold up the community for the full limit they could extract, this country could not have faced all these troubles and tribulations during the war. I do not see why any different principle should be applied to those who hold stock. We

cannot approach these problems on a purely commercial basis. If what the railway companies want is commercial treatment, the Government could easily give it without disagreement. The Government are by far the biggest customers of the railways, and those who are more familiar with the ways of commerce than I am know that when one concern is the overwhelming customer of another the serving firm is soon under the domination of the big customer, which can exact such terms as it likes. But this House has not, the Ministry has not, and the Government have not, approached this matter on that purely crude commercial basis.
Why, then, is this approach being made? That question has been asked by more than one speaker. I think I know the answer. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Antrim (Sir H. O'Neill) and his friends know well that the railway companies of this country are never going back to private control. There is ample evidence of that in the propaganda which the railway companies are disseminating. Our postbags contain a number of brochures, pamphlets, and documents actively trying to prevent nationalisation. I am being very careful, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I am not advocating in this Debate the policy of nationalisation, which we are awaiting. I am only dealing with propaganda in which the railway companies themselves object to nationalisation.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Charles Williams): It is certain that we cannot have anything said in this Debate which demands legislation. It is equally wrong to advocate legislation or to object to legislation. We cannot deal with a matter requiring legislation from either side.

Mr. Hughes: With respect, I agree, but we are discussing the financial Agreement, and the railway companies under the terms of that Agreement are entitled to have their costs as a first charge upon the revenue they collect. Part of that money is expended by the railway companies in resisting the nationalisation which they know is coming. I therefore suggest that it is within the terms of your Ruling, Sir, if I deal, not with the merits of that, but merely with the fact that they are spending money to try to prevent it. It would be money spent in vain——

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I was not objecting to the hon. and learned Gentleman mentioning that they were spending money for propaganda purposes. I was warning him, or endeavouring to warn him, that he must not carry it further and discuss whether that propaganda is good or bad. He cannot do that to-day, because it would involve legislation.

Mr. Hughes: Would it involve legislation if the Ministry of War Transport were to say to the railway companies, within the terms of the Agreement that we are now considering, "You cannot be allowed to include anti-nationalisation propaganda, or possible anti-nationalisation propaganda, as a charge, but you must pay that out of your £43,000,000"? If we could do that——

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I tried to make it plain that I am not objecting to the hon. and learned Gentleman saying that they are using this money for propaganda. I do not mind that, but I was warning the hon. and learned Gentleman that he must not go on to discuss the merits of the propaganda part of it.

Mr. Hughes: I bow to your Ruling, Sir. I take it that it is within the terms of that Ruling for me to mention that the nature of that propaganda is directed against the nationalisation of the railways. I think they show, in this regard, some undue concern. Nobody has suggested the continuance of the type of control that we have to-day for peace-time purposes. Certainly, no one would fancy that the efficient administration of the railway companies in peace time would flow from a system under which they now have to obey directions from the Ministry of War Transport. I think it is as well, in the running of this Agreement for the control of the railways, that the House should know that the railway companies have no discretion in the running of their rolling stock, and that the management of the companies, the people who know how to run trains, have no discretion without reference to the Ministry of War Transport, and that that very nearly resulted in a serious state of affairs this year.
The House will recollect that, with the onset of the flying bomb, there was, naturally, a considerable and encouraged exodus from London. It appears, from subsequent events, that there was ample rolling stock available within the control

of the railway companies, and, from inquiries I have made subsequently, that it could be used without interference to any movement of essential war materials or troops. Pressure was brought to bear upon the railway companies to provide these additional facilities, and I assume that the railway companies expressed their willingness to do so, but were unable to do so, because they were refused the permission of somebody in the Ministry of War Transport. Things got so bad that, in the end, the Noble Lord, the Minister of War Transport himself, had to go to see what was actually happening, and it was some time after that, before the trains were eventually provided.
Nobody has advocated a system for the perpetuation of an organisation of that kind, and, therefore, again I say that a good deal of the money expended on this propaganda is misdirected. Why do we have this return, again and again, of additional claims of the stockholders? It is a realisation, I think, that the net earning capacity of the railway companies for future purposes will be taken as the £43,000,000 provided for in the existing Agreement, and this recurrence of that attempt to-day is really an effort to put up the price of the railways against the time when they may be acquired by someone other than their existing legal owners. That, I think, justifies, in the minds of those who advocate it, the policy of coming again and again to get the net return under the Agreement increased.
I join wholeheartedly with my hon. Friend the Member for Peckham in saying that the railway stockholders are getting not only just but generous treatment, and I urge upon the Parliamentary Secretary not to give way by as much as a whisper when it is suggested that that return should be increased.

1.36 p.m.

Sir John Mellor: I think the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Antrim (Sir H. O'Neill) was perfectly right in raising this matter to-day, however often it has been raised before, and I hope he will go on raising it in future. When we see a persistent injustice, as we believe this to be, I think we must persist in our protest. I should very much like to follow on what several hon. Members have said, but, if I did so, I should either cover the field already covered by my


right hon. Friend or the ground I myself covered on 1st August. Therefore, I will limit myself to two points.
On 1st August, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of War Transport said:
It is sometimes argued that the Agreement bears with particular injustice on the holders of the junior railway stocks which, for some reason which I do not understand, are alleged to be the property, not of 'big business interests,' but of 'little men.' This view has evoked some little sympathy. In fact, it is without foundation of any kind."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th August, 1944; Vol. 402, c. 1352.]
That is what the Parliamentary Secretary said. In my submission, it is most clearly well founded to say that the junior railway stocks are very largely held by small people, and that has been proved in a very conclusive and clear way by a publication called "Who Owns the Railways" by Mr. Hargreaves Parkinson, which is a reprint of articles which have been published from time to time in the "Financial News."

Mr. Noel-Baker: May I ask my hon. Friend if he has noted the diagram on page 11 of that publication, which shows that the proportion of senior stocks held by the small men is quite as high as that of the junior stocks?

Sir J. Mellor: I do not dispute that.

Mr. Noel-Baker: But that is the whole point.

Sir J. Mellor: Well, I am concerned for the moment with the junior stocks, which are the ones that are either getting no dividend or a sub-normal dividend.

Mr. Noel-Baker: Yes, but, with respect, I was concerned with the attempt to create prejudice by asserting that the senior stocks were held by big business, who got their full dividend, while the small men, who held the junior stocks, got none. That was not correct.

Sir J. Mellor: I accept my hon. Friend's explanation, and I am very glad to see that he is not making a false point. I drew attention to this publication, because it is very important, and it does show, for instance, that, in the case of the L.N.E.R. junior stocks, the Preferred Ordinary and the Deferred stocks, actually over one-half of the holdings are less than £200 each in nominal value.

Mr. Alexander Walkden: May I ask my hon. Friend if he knows that there is £50,000,000 of watered capital in the junior stocks of the L.N.E.R.?

Sir J. Mellor: I have already mentioned that when interrupting the hon. and learned Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Hughes) to ask him to explain what he meant by "watered capital," but the hon. and learned Member declined the challenge. I will certainly give way, if my hon. Friend will explain.

Mr. A. Walkden: The same as the bonus shares, which have not been paid for.

Sir J. Mellor: There have been no bonus shares issued to the railways.

Mr. Charleton: What about the division of the Midland stocks in 1887?

Sir J. Mellor: I am not concerned with that. At the present time, when the aggregate nominal value of railway stocks is £1,100,000,000, it is perfectly true to say that the railways could not now be replaced, with all their assets, for less than £2,000,000,000, and it is idle to say that that capital could be regarded as watered in any respect whatsoever.

Mr. Hughes: My hon. Friend mentions that half of one type of stock is held by people who own less than £200 worth. Does he mean half in number or in total value?

Sir J. Mellor: More than half the holdings were represented by holdings of less than £200 in nominal value, but the market value is probably one-tenth or less of the nominal value.

Mr. Hughes: My hon. Friend has not grasped what I am asking. He told us the number of holdings. How much does half the number of holdings represent in total value of stock?

Sir J. Mellor: I have here a rather elaborate table, which I am pleased to hand to my hon. Friend. Perhaps he would like to examine it for himself?

Mr. Hughes: Mr. Hughes rose——

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: This handing round of pamphlets does not allow a second speech.

Sir J. Mellor: The other point to which I wish to refer is with regard to the substituted standard appropriate to Excess Profits taxation, which, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Antrim suggested, should have been applied in the case of the railway companies. I pressed the Parliamentary Secretary upon this point on 1st August, and interrupted him, when making his speech, to ask him to deal with the point. What he said was this:
That is a very hypothetical matter I cannot argue now. It is extremely doubtful whether on any standards they would come out better."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 1st August, 1944; Vol. 402, c. 1352.]
I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will take the opportunity of dealing with the matter when he replies, because I really think it would be absurd to say that the railway companies would not come out better if they were treated on an Excess Profits Tax basis, instead of treating them as they are under the present Agreement. As I said just now, the actual real value of their assets to-day is probably in the neighbourhood of £2,000,000,000 but even taking their book value, which is somewhere about £1,100,000,000, they would come out very much better on substituted standard. That is more certainly the case because their finance in the past has been extremely conservative. Before the war, at all events, when there had to be replacement of an asset, and it had to be done at an enhanced cost, the value of the asset as it stood in the books was not written up. It was maintained at the existing value and the increased cost was provided out of revenue, and so a large amount of revenue was ploughed back into capital.
That is one of the reasons why these junior stock holders have not seen dividends for such a long time. If the financial policy of the railways had been less conservative, then perhaps these junior stockholders would have enjoyed dividends, but if that had been the case the railways would not have been in the fine fettle in which the Government found them at the outbreak of the war and they would not have seen us through this war in the magnificent way they have. We ought, therefore, to recognise that the great national asset which the railways have proved to be in this war has been partly due to the sacrifices accepted by the junior stockholders before the war. I do most earnestly wish to support the plea

put forward by my right hon. Friend the Member for Antrim and I beg of the Parliamentary Secretary to take this opportunity of giving us a very full reply.

1.47 p.m.

Colonel Sir George Courthope: I do not wish to take up the time of the House by joining in the general discussion. I intervene only for a few moments to refer to two statements which I believe to be somewhat incorrect. The first was made by the hon. Member for Peckham (Mr. Silkin), who stated very definitely that the Railway Control Agreement was freely negotiated. It was not. It was negotiated in the shadow of an assurance—I will not put it stronger than that—that if it was not accepted, something much worse would be imposed. I do not want to exaggerate or over-state the case. The other point I wish to correct is this. My hon. Friend the Member for South-East St. Pancras (Sir A. Beit) laid great stress upon the statement which he made that the arrangements for renewals were exceedingly favourable. I do not think they were. The Clause in the Summary of the Agreement, which I have here, says:
The maintenance charges, including renewals, are standardised on the basis of the average pre-war charge, adjusted to variations of assets concerned and to price levels.
I do not suggest that they were unfair, but I do not think that a case can be made out for exceptionally favourable treatment of railways in that Clause.

PASSENGER TRANSPORT VEHICLES (CONSTRUCTION ORDER)

1.49 p.m.

Sir Wavell Wakefield: Last week a number of hon. Members put Questions to the Ministry of War Transport about the refusal of that Department to alter the Construction Order relating to public vehicles. Those of us who asked the Questions received a most unsatisfactory answer and I gave notice then that I would raise the matter on the Adjournment at the earliest possible moment. I am, therefore, grateful to you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, for giving me the opportunity of catching your eye so early after this matter was raised, because the refusal by the Minister of War Transport to make an alteration in this Construction Order may just make all the


difference between the life and death, in the next two years of our export trade, of an industry which; if helped instead of obstructed, can well bring added employment to many thousands of our people.
The matter is now one of extreme urgency. The history of it is as follows. An application was made on a significant date—5th November, 1943—by the motor trade for a review of the Regulations affecting public service vehicles. That request has been frustrated just as effectively as another form of application was near this place some centuries ago. But there is an important difference, however, between that plot and this plan. That plot was to the public disadvantage, but this plan put forward by the motor trade is to the great public advantage. On 5th November, 1943, just over a year ago, a Memorandum was sent to the Ministry of War Transport. I will read a few lines from this Memorandum, which sets out fully the purpose of it. The Memorandum reads:
Before the war, the design of road passenger vehicles was severely hampered by the restrictions imposed by the Road Traffic Act of 1930 and other legislation. The organisations which now submit this Memorandum to the Ministry of War Transport represent virtually the entire road passenger transport of the country, covering both the operating and the manufacturing sections. This Memorandum represents the unanimous proposals of the industry for the revision of the dimensional regulations which affect public service vehicles.
So the House will see that this is a unanimous request of both operational and manufacturing sections of the motor industry. A number of requests were made, but I am only going to deal with the two main requests; of the number made there were two of outstanding importance. The first one was that the maximum permissible overall length for all public service vehicles, single or double-deck, with two or more axles, should be 30 feet. The second request was that the maximum permissible overall width for all public service vehicles should be eight feet. On 19th April, 1944, a further additional Memorandum was submitted to the Ministry of War Transport at that Ministry's request amplifying the details of the first Memorandum. This request was turned down by the Ministry of War Transport on 20th November, 1944. I must make it clear that this very reasonable request was turned down without any discussion what-

soever with any of the interests in the motor trade mostly concerned. They submitted their Memorandum, but I am informed that there was no discussion of it with them.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: Was any reason given for turning it down?

Sir W. Wakefield: I am coming to that a little later, if the hon. Member will allow me.

Mr. Noel-Baker: Was any request made for discussions?

Sir W. Wakefield: When a Memorandum is submitted surely it is the duty of the Government Department to go fully into the matter, and the substance of my complaint is that the Government Department has failed in its duty and has not gone fully into the whole matter. Before I give the reasons for turning it down, I will give the reasons which the motor trade put forward for this alteration in length and width. There are two main reasons. One concerns the home position and the other concerns the foreign position, that of our export trade. I will deal with the home position first. By altering the length and the width in the way required of public passenger vehicles much additional comfort would be given to passengers. They would be of greater convenience and not only that, there would be much easier working conditions for the conductors. The extra six inches of width would make quite a substantial difference to the comfort or otherwise of passengers. Conductors have to go up and down the gangway and it would make it easier for them, in a crowded bus, to get to the end and ensure, therefore, greater safety in stopping and starting omnibuses and in passengers getting on or off. Therefore, there are convenience, comfort and safety concerned in this required alteration.
The second point I wish to make is that of safety. By altering it in the way required there would be greater stability in passenger vehicles. With a wider chassis, wider brake-drums could be fitted, and there would be better facilities generally for brake-layout. Wider vehicles would be safer and less accident prone. There is another very important consideration which has recently developed in connection with the safety of public service vehicles. The Tyre and


Rim Association of the United States of America, an effective world authority on these matters, has increased the width of tyres and rims and the spacing between tyres. A wider vehicle is required to accommodate them and, as a result of experience which has been gained, better lay-out and less road friction result. Furthermore, it is not possible to provide tyres made of synthetic rubber which will carry the normal weight of a bus within the size which is now available.
These are powerful arguments and due and proper consideration has not been given to them by the Ministry of War Transport. I want to put this point to the Parliamentary Secretary. If the 7 feet 6 inches maximum width now allowed is not increased to 8 feet, it will be necessary to reduce the width of the chassis frame. This will mean a reduced safety tilting angle and a greater danger, therefore, of vehicles overturning. The public ought to be made aware of this danger due to the deliberate refusal of the Ministry of War Transport to discuss this matter with the manufacturers and with the operators, who are really much better qualified to judge these things than anybody in his Department.
The Ministry refuses to increase the length to 30 feet for a two-axle vehicle, although a 30 feet 3-axle vehicle is permitted. No explanation has been forthcoming as to why there should be this differentiation. As far as safety is concerned, it is purely a matter of adequate design and nothing else. The refusal of the Ministry on this matter is quite a mystery. The answer given to the motor trade was, "General consideration as to road safety and traffic congestion in urban areas." Now how a two-axle vehicle 30 feet long can cause any more traffic congestion than a 30 feet long three-axle vehicle, exactly the same length, or why a single-deck vehicle, again exactly the same length as a double-deck vehicle, should cause more congestion, is really one of those mysteries that emerge from Government Departments which the plain man in the street cannot understand. With regard to the request for an increase in width—most important, most necessary, most vital—the Minister just brushed aside that request in the most autocratic manner possible. This is what he said about it, that, having regard to

road conditions in this country, he was not going to allow it.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: Was that in answer to a Question in this House?

Sir W. Wakefield: No, that was in the official reply made to the motor trade who originally put forward the request.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: They replied, then? I understood earlier that there was no reply.

Sir W. Wakefield: I am sorry that the hon. and gallant Member has misunderstood me. A memorandum was sent a year ago, and the reply came back last month refusing these very reasonable requests which had been put forward.

Mr. Alexander Walkden: May I ask whether the motor industry asked for an interview, and, if so, was the interview refused?

Sir W. Wakefield: No, all I know is this: The motor industry put forward these requests, and the next thing they heard about them, a year later, was a sudden turning down.

Mr. Noel-Baker: Oh, no.

Sir W. Wakefield: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will explain why, because there have been no reasoned arguments put forward in support of this refusal about the width—just a blank wall of refusal. There have been no discussions, so far as I can make out, with technicians, with the experts who are very fully informed on likely developments, new progress being made, new materials coming into use—all those things which must be studied and discussed now which affect future production many years ahead. Now, so far as I am aware, no discussions on all these technical matters took place with the home and the export industry. I am informed by people who are in touch with various organisations that the London Passenger Transport Board technical people do not know anything about it.
A number of city engineers who have been approached do not know anything about it. Some chief constables have had some requests sent to them, I believe; in the case of the Lancashire County Council, which covers a very wide urban area, it was put to their war emergency committee. I do not know what that war emergency committee knows about it. Were


any members of the public, any consumers, the users of these buses, asked their opinion of it? I think the House ought to know what the Minister asked, whom he asked, what were the replies sent to him, what questionnaires were sent out, who were consulted. Why was not the motor trade given an opportunity to discuss this matter with all these objectors, whoever they may be? I think it was reasonable to assume that the motor industry would have their request granted, and, if it were not possible to grant their request, would it not be decent and right to say, "We do not think we can accede to your request, and, in consequence, will you please come and discuss the various objections raised with us?" Would that not have been a reasonable and democratic thing to do instead of adopting the autocratic attitude that was taken up?

Mr. A. Walkden: Would it not have been businesslike to ask the Minister to receive a deputation? Ministers are very busy and are not likely to ask deputations to come and see them. Why did not the motor trade ask for a deputation to he received?

Miss Ward: Why not?

Sir W. Wakefield: The Minister has made the decision without being informed of all the facts, and I suggest to the House that it is the duty of Ministers to make themselves fully informed of all the facts. From what I can make out, full information has not been obtained by the Minister in this matter.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: I do not want to interrupt too much, but the hon. Gentleman says that the Minister has not enough information on this matter. I know that the hon. Gentleman the Member for Swindon (Sir W. Wakefield) is a stickler for etiquette and no doubt, before raising this matter to-day, he communicated with the Minister asking all these questions that he is now asking; perhaps he saw him privately. Surely he can tell the House what was the answer to those previous communications that he sent to the Minister?

Sir W. Wakefield: I am much obliged to the hon. and gallant Member for St. Marylebone (Captain Cunningham-Reid) for putting that point to me. I raised this matter in the House first last May, eight

or nine months ago, and then, owing to the urgency of the matter, I raised it again, and the reply I received was that the matter was under consideration.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: The hon. Member raised it by Question?

Sir W. Wakefield: Yes, by Question on the-Floor of the House. I raised it again on the matter of export trade, and again last week by Question, and I have seen the Parliamentary Secretary as well. It is not for me to put words into his mouth. I am raising these grievances, which are felt by a large and very important section of the manufacturing community of this country, in order to give him the opportunity of making a reply.
That is the substance of our complaint. We want to know why there is all this secrecy; why there is all this hush-hush policy, this hole-in-the-corner business, no reasons or arguments given but just blank refusal. I would like to ask the Parliamentary Secretary this. Is he aware that there are many eight-foot vehicles running on the roads now and for some years past, that there are many American vehicles of all kinds running on our roads quite satisfactorily? Does he not remember that about seven years ago permission was given for certain vehicles, produced prior to 1932, to run on the roads in excess of the width of seven feet six inches, provided that the original solid tyres were converted to pneumatics? Some of those wide vehicles are still running in congested dock areas with no ill effects. I put it to the Parliamentary Secretary, if there is congestion on the roads, then widen the roads; do not make the people suffer, and cause loss of our export trade, instead of giving employment on the roads and in our factories.
Now I come to the most serious aspect of this refusal, that is, the irreparable damage which is being done and will be done to our export trade. In the Gracious Speech many of us were encouraged by the words that His Majesty's Ministers
… will try to create conditions favourable to the expansion of our export trade and the re-equipment of our industry.
Heartening words those were, especially when it is remembered that the Prime Minister, and many other Ministers as well, have impressed upon the country the need for increasing our export trade


by at least 50 per cent. if we are to maintain our standard of living. I want the Parliamentary Secretary to take that extract from the Gracious Speech to heart, because the policy that his Department is pursuing is precisely contrary to those words in the Gracious Speech. There is no help whatsoever, but hindrance being given to our export trade by the policy he is pursuing.
Why is damage being done to our export trade by this refusal of the Parliamentary Secretary to alter this Construction Order? First of all, if we are to compete in the markets abroad, it is essential that as far as possible mass production takes place. It is obviously going to be much more costly to jig and tool up for one kind of vehicle for the home trade and to jig and tool up for another kind of vehicle for the export trade. There is increased need for assembly in foreign countries and, where fabrication takes place, it is obvious that all parts wherever possible should be interchangeable. If we are to get our export trade, we must be able to compete in price. Now, Sir, foreign countries want the greater width because of its greater safety and because of the greater comfort which extra width and greater length give. I want to point out to the House that the Americans build only eight feet and above. American manufacturers are under no such handicap as are the manufacturers in our country; they are a bit more progressive in the United States of America than we are here. Unless we build in quantity, and with all the comforts that the greater width and the greater length give, we cannot get the business, and unless adequate care is taken to take full advantage of the new materials now coming on the market and fresh and new designs, again we cannot get the business. About a week ago, at the time when I was raising this matter in the House, I received from a foreign country a telegram, and I think it may be of interest to the House if I read it because it is very relevant to this export trade business:
Consider necessary have British Government's final decision on essential specifications for road vehicles especially buses before approaching Government. Can you urge Ministry of Transport—

ROYAL ASSENT

Message to attend the Lords Commissioners.

The House went; and, having re-turned—

Mr. SPEAKER reported the Royal Assent to:

1. Consolidated Fund (No. I) Act, 1944 (Session 2).
2. Expiring Laws Continuance Act, 1944.
3. Local Elections and Register of Electors (Temporary Provisions) Act, 1944.
4. London Midland and Scottish Railway Act, 1944.
5. London Midland and Scottish Railway (Canals) Act, 1944.

And to the following Measure passed under the provisions of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919:

Emergency Legislation Measure, 1944.

Question again proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."

PASSENGER TRANSPORT VEHICLES (CONSTRUCTION ORDER)

Sir W. Wakefield: When we were interrupted I was about to read a telegram which I received last week from a foreign country. This is it:
Considered necessary to have British Government's final decision on essential specification for road vehicles, especially buses, before approaching Government. Can you or Ministry of Transport in interest of British post-war trade expedite decision? Consider this point most important to guard against foreign competition.

Mr. J. J. Davidson: I am interested in the hon. Gentleman's argument and I am always interested in understanding exactly what type of pressure is most successful on various Ministries. Was this telegram sent to him or as a Member of Parliament interested in road safety or as one interested in the motor industry?

Sir W. Wakefield: I really do not know. It arrived out of the blue. I had no expectation of receiving it at all, but it arrived about the time that my Question was due to be answered. It came as a surprise to me. It just happened. That is why I quoted it, because clearly this


refusal of the Department to help the export trade is having an adverse effect. Future planning is held up and preparation is at a standstill until a fresh decision is made. Prototypes of the types required for our export trade will not be forthcoming. The export trade is in jeopardy and the position is tragic. I do not believe that the Minister of War Transport gives the export position adequate consideration. The matter was referred to in the recent Debate on the export trade and the President of the Board of Trade knew very, very little about it. I have written to him very fully on the position and he now knows all about it. At any rate, there has been very considerable activity amongst his officials, who are running around wanting to know what all the fuss is about and why it should be necessary to alter the Construction Order in order that the export trade may be assisted. I hope I have shown how serious the position is and that much more careful consideration ought to be given to the request of the motor trade.
I should like to ask whether the Minister will receive a deputation from the trade, led if necessary by Members of Parliament, in order to reconsider the whole question and, if their proposals do not meet with acceptance, which I think quite unbelievable, that there should be a public inquiry, with all relevant documents made public, so that the public may really get to the bottom of this obstinate refusal to study their comfort and provide for their future employment. Congestion on our roads can be overcome by widening them, thereby causing employment. Congestion on our unemployment queues can also be caused by the loss of our export trade. Let the Minister prevent both by speedy action. If he does not, I warn him that grave consequences will follow.

2.28 p.m.

Mr. Charleton: I think the hon. Member's statement is more eloquent for what he has not said than for what he has said. He made a point about six inches greater width for public coaches and stressed the convenience and comfort of passengers and greater space for the conductor to go up and down. That six inches divided out means an inch per seat—almost negligible. What I think he really wants, though he has not said it, is greater width for lorries and

heavy commercial vehicles. They want greater and greater vehicles for carrying commercial goods on the road. In this little island of ours the roads are not built for that purpose, neither are our towns. At some of our pleasure resorts, many of which are old-fashioned towns, when a lorry or coach turns a corner all the traffic in every direction has to be stopped. The time has not come when we can put bigger juggernauts on the road. As an old motorist, I think the average driver would be terrified to get behind these juggernauts that will be built, because directly they get permission they will build to the full extent.
The argument as to our export trade is all very well but there are two sides to it. The trade would not be a one way trade. If we sell lorries abroad in great numbers they have to be paid for with something, and that something will be in the form of goods. Does it mean that goods that will come in will be different from the goods which come in now, and that people who might be taken into the motor building trade would be supplanted by people of other trades who are put out of business because of the new imports? I suggest that the whole matter has been put forward in the interests of the motor building trade, but that in the interests of thousands of drivers who will come on to the roads after the war we should not permit this extension of size until our roads are made fit to receive the bigger vehicles.

2.31 p.m.

Mr. Bartle Bull: The question of the design of public service vehicles for the export trade is very important to Britain at the moment. I found when I was in India, a long time ago, America had more or less cornered the market for what were called "Continental models," which were high horse-power cars which had a greater clearance than ours. I wish to raise again, however, the question of right-hand driving which, I suggest, should be introduced now. Most certainly, America will not change to our way, although I would like to say for their benefit, in case they are interested, that it is actually historically right to drive on the left. Nevertheless, I do not think there is any possibility of persuading them to change to our method. We have now come to the time when we ought to change because there are not


many vehicles on the roads of Britain at the moment, and most of our troops abroad are now driving on the right hand side of the road in vehicles which have a left-hand drive. It would also be a good opportunity for the few taxis which remain in London to start to drive on the right of the road, as there is now plenty of room for manoeuvre.
Whatever the design of vehicles should be, I should like to say that by far the best truck in the Western Desert in the early part of this war was the British Morris 15 cwt. truck. It was far better than any American vehicle, as I think anyone who has served out there will agree. I have nothing to do with the motor trade but I appeal to the Parliamentary Secretary to consider this matter again. At the same time, I think it would be admirable to change to the decimal system with regard to mileage. It does not matter whether they are miles, rods, poles or perches—they ought to be dividable by 10. When you buy a public service vehicle it would also be much easier to introduce the decimal system with regard to the purchase price. The pound could be divided into, say, 20 florins——

Mr. Speaker: The monetary system is regulated by law and any question affecting a change in the law cannot be raised in an Adjournment Debate.

Mr. Bull: Forgive me, Sir, but it is a good point all the same. To return to the question of the right hand drive, I very much doubt, from the observations which the motor trade have made to me through the post, whether they support me in this matter, but I think this is a good time to help them to help themselves because many people depend for their livelihood, or will do after the war, on a flourishing motor trade and, through that trade, on our export trade. I also think it would be a good thing if street names were lowered, especially for the benefit of drivers of public service vehicles so that it would not be necessary to use a bright torch to read them.

2.35 p.m.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: I do not intend to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield (Mr. Bull) in his very interesting theories concerning the decimal system, a matter which is perhaps a little irrelevant to the discussion

but which is, none the less, interesting. I would like to associate myself with the remarks made by the hon. Member for South Leeds (Mr. Charleton). I entirely agree with the conclusions at which he arrived. The transport, comfort and safety of the public are undoubtedly of paramount importance, and that was no doubt also exercising the mind of the hon. Member for Swindon (Sir W. Wakefield). I do not know whether I should have said "the hon. and gallant Member," but if I should I apologise for the omission. If that is his objective I think that his speech was not very helpful to that end, and it appeared that he was very confused in his argument. He gave way courteously on several occasions to enable some of us to clear up points, but at the end of his speech I was not at all clear about what he intended to say. In the first place, he said that the Ministry concerned had refused to discuss this matter when it was brought forward by the appropriate authorities and a little later we elucidated that when that memorandum was put in no request was made for an answer to be given to it. It seems difficult to reconcile those two statements. Perhaps there was some very bad staff work. I hope that if the hon. Member had anything to do with that his staff work in Marylebone, for his sake, will be better.
Now we come to another matter. The hon. Member gave us reasons why there should be increased dimensions in public vehicles, with some of which I was in agreement, but he also admitted at the same time that in order to do this it would be necessary to widen the roads of this country. That would have been all right had he not suggested that, first of all, we should widen public vehicles, that is to say putting the cart before the horse, which would be absurd. Then he went on to tell us why this was so important to the export trade. He did not mention though that road transport conditions in our Dominions and Colonies were often very different from those in this country. In the Dominions they have long wide roads and straight streets in many towns. We to-day have first to consider what are the conditions in this country. I agree that the export trade is very important, indeed, but I do not think we should lose sight of another important factor, namely, the growing death-rate on our roads. Before we proceed to


widen public service vehicles what we ought to do is to tackle our roads. Having done that, the hon. Member's speech, although somewhat confused, would be appropriate. Until that time I would suggest to the Minister that we should put first things first.

2.42 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of War Transport (Mr. Noel-Baker): I regret that the House and I should have to perform mental acrobratics in changing with great rapidity from one highly technical subject to another, and I regret still further that some of those who were interested in the first part of this Debate are not at present in their places but they will, no doubt, return in time to hear me talk about the second part. I hope these hon. Members will not think, when they read HANSARD, that I am dealing in a perfunctory way with their speeches by not making lengthy or detailed answers co many things which were said about the Railway Control Agreement. I listened to the speeches with the greatest care, but with all respect I think they brought out very few new points about the merits of the Agreement and that it is not an exaggeration to say that they brought out none which has not been dealt with adequately on a previous occasion. I dealt with this matter fairly fully in the Debate on the Adjournment as recently as 1st August last. Nothing that has happened since, none of the public discussion which has taken place—and there has been a good deal in the Press—has in any way affected the validity of what I then said.
I will, therefore, try to summarise as briefly as I can the main arguments about the merits of the Railway Agreement. I do not at all accept what was said by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Rye (Sir G. Courthope), that the Agreement was not accepted as a voluntary Agreement between the parties. He repeated the charge that it was made under duress, with the threat of something worse. That is often said, but no evidence has been produced and it has never been maintained by any responsible person who has dealt with the subject. I would like to repeat again what was said by my predecessor, my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Uxbridge (Colonel Llewellin), who is now the Minister of

Food. He said in a Debate in this House in October, 1941, that revision of the original Agreement was required, for reasons which he specified, and went on to say:
I would like to emphasise that the Agreement to revise the former arrangements was a voluntary matter, and not imposed upon the railways."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd October, 1941; Vol. 374; c. 1813.]
I should have thought that that had settled the matter for good and all, but if any further assurance is required I would like to tell the right hon. Gentleman, or any other Member of the House and others who may be interested, that my Noble Friend the Minister of War Transport will be ready to give any further assurances of any kind that are required. I, therefore, hope that this baseless charge will not be made again, either inside or outside this House.
On the merits of the Agreement and whether it is just or not to the stockholders, I venture to repeat what I have said on several occasions in the House, that His Majesty's Government believe that the Agreement negotiated by my noble Friend, with the help of my right hon. and gallant Friend, now the Minister of Food, is fair and just. I quote again a letter from the Treasury written when Sir Kingsley Wood was Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which it is pointed out that the annual payment "exceeds by a considerable amount the average net revenue of the controlled undertakings in the period immediately before the war." One of my hon. Friends, I think it was my right hon. Friend the Member for Antrim (Sir H. O'Neill), who opened the Debate, spoke of certain London and North-Eastern stocks. He mentioned the £78,000,000 worth of stock which received no dividend under the Agreement. That is true, but a large part of that stock received none for 16 years before the Agreement was made and the rest received no dividend for if years before. Is it really supposed that, because we are in the middle of a war, we have to make an arrangement that will give dividends to people who have not received them for all that time?

Sir J. Mellor: Has not that happened in the case of a large number of companies, and have they not been able to pay during the war dividends on stocks which had not received dividends for many years before the war?

Mr. Noel-Baker: I shall be glad to receive from the hon. Baronet any information on that point which he likes to send me. I hope he will also deal with the question of the nature of the stock. I turn to the London & North Eastern 4 per cent. The last year in which it received 4 per cent. was 1929. Including that year, the average for the last 10 years before the war was 1.2 per cent. In five of these years it got no dividend at all. The highest year was 1¾ per cent. in 1937, while in the three years of this Agreement the average has been 2 7/16 per cent., which is more than twice as much. I venture to think that on the individual stocks, or on the payment as a whole, no case for injustice can be made out.
One of my hon. Friends raised the question of the Excess Profits Duty. I think it was the hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth (Sir J. Mellor), who said he hoped I would be more explicit than I was in August. I am in the same difficulty now as I was in in August, namely, that this is primarily the responsibility of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and, therefore, I must speak with caution. Broadly, I am in agreement with the admirable speech of the hon. Baronet the Member for South-East St. Pancras (Sir A. Beit). I think it extremely doubtful, as I said in August, whether under any substituted standard the railway companies would do as well as in fact they do under this Agreement. I still hold that a great public service like this, which is of the nature of a monopoly, is in a very different position from an ordinary munitions business. But the real and conclusive answer to the hon. Baronet is that this Agreement was made by the railway companies, and it was voluntarily made. Its purpose was to settle the question of remuneration. It was made for the whole period of control and, therefore, the question of a substituted standard really does not arise.

Sir J. Mellor: Has my hon. Friend formed any estimate of what a substituted standard would be and calculated what 6 per cent. would amount to on that?

Mr. Noel-Baker: Has my hon. Friend tried to work out a substituted standard for anything that would be allowed on the basis of the pre-war years? Has he got an answer? I shall be glad to see it,

for I have never seen one yet. I have tried to get one, but I cannot reach any result which leads me to think that he is right and I am wrong.
I turn to the question of the standard revenue. My right hon. Friend the Member for Antrim recited a number of facts about standard revenue. I do not remember if he said that it had never been earned before the war. I do not remember if he said that it could not be earned and that the Railway Tribunal had examined the matter and had arrived at the conclusion that an increase of charges would not lead to an increase of revenue. He spoke of the competition from road haulage. Of course, that affects the earning capacity of the railways. It is a very important fact, but that does not mean that, because the general economic position of the railways has been changed by new competition, we should allow for that in this Agreement and adjust the matter. I arrive at the conclusion, which I ventured to put forward in August, that the facts are enough to show that my Noble Friend could not possibly take standard revenue as a basis for the Agreement. If he had taken it as a basis, he would have admitted a claim for greatly enhanced profits as a result of the war, a claim which nobody puts forward and which nobody in this House or outside would admit. To that conclusion the Government adhere.
There is one other point which I did not put in our previous Debate. It relates to the general policy of the Government about transport. During the operation of this Agreement we have been driving traffic off the roads and pushing it on to the railways. By our decisions, we have been cutting down train mileage. We have been increasing very greatly the loading of goods wagons, beyond any standards that existed in time of peace. We have prevented the construction of new motor vehicles. We have prevented the increase of bus services, and abolished coaches. We have virtually prohibited private motoring except for certain purposes. We have cut out cross hauls on the railways. We have cut out clerical and other work which in war conditions could be avoided. We have reduced expenditure in many ways. A vast amount of the additional traffic is military and other Government traffic. The revenue which comes to the Government now


comes out of the traffic which the Government themselves put on the railways. In view of that is it not plain that the Agreement is right? Is not that general background of Government transport policy a matter to which serious consideration must be given when the justice of the remuneration allowed under the Agreement is taken into account? I end this part of what I have to say by repeating that I think the Agreement is fair and just, and by giving an assurance to my hon. Friend the Member for Peckham (Mr. Silkin) and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Moelwyn Hughes) that my Noble Friend has no intention of making the changes for which we have been asked.
Three other points were raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Antrim; of which he was kind enough to give me previous notice. The first relates to abnormal wear and tear. It is common ground that the calls upon the lines and the rolling stock have been heavier than they have ever been in times past. The Government have not been able to allow to the railways all the labour, skilled and unskilled, which the railways needed for maintenance, repairs and new construction. If you cannot keep up with the normal programme of repairs and new construction, the effects inevitably tend to be cumulative. There will, therefore, be arrears of maintenance. That is why the railway Agreement contained Clause 11 which deals with the matter. Among other things, the Clause plainly makes provision for an allowance for abnormal wear and tear of maintainable assets if it is agreed to be justified over and above the basic figure for maintenance. The Minister met the chairmen of the railway companies last summer, and discussed the whole matter with them. He wrote a letter to Lord Royden, Chairman of the Railway Companies Association, on 16th June, and he then said that, while he could not commit himself in any way—I must repeat that—until the matter had been fully investigated, he was prepared to examine it with the chairmen without delay. My Noble Friend has begun his investigations without delay, but plainly no final arrangements can be made until the period of control is ended. The effects of wear and tear must be surveyed over the period as a whole. Any other plan might be unfair to one side or the other;

we cannot now say which. In my hon. Friend's investigations he is bearing in mind the possibility that some interim or provisional arrangement might be come to, which would be taken into account when, at the end of the period of control, the final settlement is made. I hope that my right hon. Friend will think that that statement gives him, at least, some satisfaction.
That brings me to his second point, the duration of the control. The Agreement deals with that point also in article 33, which provides that
control will be continued for a minimum period of one year after the cessation of hostilities. Before control comes to an end, that is, before all statutory rights and obligations as they exist at that time apply to the controlled undertakings, time will be given for the operation of any statutory machinery governing the level of charges.
On that text, two questions arise. First, as my right hon. Friend asked, what is meant by the "cessation of hostilities"? When the Agreement was made it was not contemplated—at least, it was not certain—that there would be two wars, although it was contemplated by farseeing persons on all sides of the House, including, I humbly submit, myself. The phrase "cessation of hostilities" occurs in a great many other official documents, Acts of Parliament and agreements of all kinds, and it will be necessary for the Government to make a general ruling as to what is intended to be understood by the phrase. I have no doubt that that general ruling will govern this particular case, and it is clearly impossible, and it would not be proper, for me to attempt to speak with authority on that point to-day. Perhaps, however, I may say this. The Agreement lays down a minimum period for which the control is due to last. Under these terms the period must be at least one year after the termination of hostilities. It may be more but it cannot be less. None of us can forsee the future and anything may happen, but if I had to make a guess, I think I should guess that the control is likely to go on, with the general agreement of all concerned, longer than one year after the cessation of hostilities.

Mr. A. Walkden: May I remind my hon. Friend that after the last war, in the interests of all concerned, control was continued for nearly three years?

Mr. Noel-Baker: That is true, and what my hon. Friend says is reinforced by the special technical reasons which arise under article 33. Under that article, as I read it, time must be given to the Railway Rates Tribunal to operate the statutory machinery, to look at the probable level of traffic which there will be under post-war conditions, and then to proceed to fix the charges which they think should then be made. That might mean an increase in charges; it might even mean a decrease. In any case, it is extremely unlikely that the process can be fulfilled within a single year. For that reason, and for the other general reasons to which my hon. Friend has referred, I should say, if I had to make a guess, that control is more likely to last two years than one year after the end of the war. I think that, if that were done, it would be done with the full agreement of the railway companies. In any case, it is a point on which we can hope for friendly discussion with the railway companies at any time they like.
The probable duration of the Agreement has an obvious bearing on the third point put to me in his letter by my right hon. Friend, whether there has been any further decision on general policy concerning the future of inland transport. My right hon. Friend said that in the arrangement made we ought to include both road and rail, and that, unless some arrangements were made for co-ordinating and, as I understood him, for eliminating the competition, or controlling the competition, between road and rail, the future must be dark and difficult for all concerned. He said he hoped we should have prosperous concerns, standing on their own feet.
I think there is general agreement that we cannot, in inland transport, whether on the roads, railways or waterways, go back to the conditions of 1939. I do not think anybody wants to do so, but as to definite, final decisions of general policy, I must frankly say to the House that my Noble Friend has not yet been able to make them. He has, as the House knows, a very heavy operational task. He is pushing on with the technical study of the re-organisation of inland transport which will certainly be required after the war. But he has not yet been able to make, in spite of the discussions he has had and the studies he has made, new decisions which I can now announce to my right hon. Friend, or to the House. 
I turn now to the second subject which has been raised, namely, the Regulations concerning new road vehicles. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Swindon (Sir W. Wakefield) made it very plain that a grievance is felt in some quarters—if in none other, then certainly by himself—about the way in which this matter has been dealt with by my Noble Friend and the Ministry which he controls. [Interruption.] I hope I shall satisfy all the critics, including the hon. Lady. I think the hon. Lady herself said, in the Question on the Paper, that the Ministry had taken a very long time to reach a decision, that it had not consulted the proper people—indeed, perhaps, had not consulted anybody, I do not quite remember—and that the decision which was taken neglects very important interests relating to the development of our export trade; and my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Swindon said that my Department had gravely failed to do its duty. He will forgive me if I say that I resent the charges which he made, and, when I have explained the facts, I hope he will withdraw them.
I will begin by stating the history of what occurred. Last November, the 5th, as he said—I do not know whether there is any significance in that—we received a letter from five organisations, the A.R.O., the C.M.U.A., the Municipal Passenger Transport Association, the Public Transport Association and the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. They sent us a request in general terms for the revision of Regulations for the post-war period relating to public passenger vehicles. We did not take immediate action on that request for two reasons, first, because, with all our optimism, we did not feel, in November, 1943, that the war was as yet very near its end. We thought we still had time. Events have proved that we were all too right. In the second place, we expected—and, as I shall again show, with reason—that other similar requests might be received from other organisations, and, therefore, we waited for a little while before we made a move.
But, in February, we did ask these five organisations, who sent us the original memorandum, to send a full statement of what they wanted, and the reasons on which their requests were based. We asked them to put everything they had to say on paper. They did so.


Their reply came in April, and we thought that they had put forward all their reasons with the precision and the clarity which such great organisations would normally have used. We thought there was no obscure point in the memorandum at all, that we understood exactly what they wanted, and exactly why they wanted it. They ended their memorandum with the words:
In conclusion, the five organisations would repeat that they are prepared to appoint a deputation to meet officials at the Ministry of War Transport to discuss the matters dealt with in this Memorandum.
We did not think there was anything we needed to discuss. We understood it. If they wanted to discuss with us on any point, it was open to them, at any time, to make a request either to officials, or to my Noble Friend or to myself. Any one of us would have been delighted to meet any of them for discussion for as long as they desired. We never heard another word until the decision had been made.
We did not answer the memorandum immediately. Why not? Because, again, we expected, and as I shall show, with reason, that further requests would in fact come in. So we waited till June. In June, we decided that no more requests were coming in, not, at any rate, at that stage, so we then proceeded to apply the provisions of the Road Traffic Act of 1930, by which we are bound. That Act obliges the Minister, when he is drawing up Regulations—and, of course, that means making changes in Regulations which already exist—to consult representative organisations whom he thinks it desirable to consult. That is a statutory obligation. The Minister, and his predecessors, have always interpreted that obligation very widely. In consequence, he communicated with organisations varying in character from the Home Office to the Pedestrians' Association, from the Regional Transport Commissioners to the Standing Joint Committee of the A.A., the R.A.C. and R.S.A.C. and the Road Transport Organisation Joint Conference, Half a page of them. My hon. and gallant Friend asked whom we consulted. We consulted all of them.

Captain Plugge: May I ask whether the London Passenger Transport Board was included?

Mr. Noel-Baker: Yes, unless I am very much mistaken, it was; if not directly, then indirectly. In making up our minds we had, naturally, to give very special weight to the arguments laid before us by the Home Office, by the highway authorities and by the police. We gave three months—until October—for the answers to come in. Will any hon. Member say that that was too long?

Miss Ward: Yes.

Mr. Noel-Baker: I hope the hon. Lady will consider the difficulty of getting busy people to answer questionnaires, and if we had gone on without waiting for answers from these people none would have been so indignant as the hon. Lady.

Miss Ward: There should have been a conference.

Mr. J. J. Davidson: May I draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to the fact that the Motor Association themselves failed to send a reply within the three months which they were requested to do?

Miss Ward: I think there should have been a conference of all those interested. I do not see why——

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Mr. Charles Williams): This is not the time for a lecture on conferences.

Miss Ward: The hon. Gentleman provoked me.

Mr. Noel-Baker: I would not like to provoke the hon. Lady and I had no such intention. I will admit to her that I think my Noble Friend does right to follow the procedure which has been followed by his predecessors when carrying out the statutory obligation to consult representative organisations. He has done exactly the same as they have always done and I venture to think that he has been right. He received the last answers about the end of October and on 31st October he closed the list. On 20th November he made his decision and communicated it to those who had submitted the original Memorandum. I am now informed that they included the L.P.T.B., who were therefore bound by the statement of April, to which, on their behalf, someone had set his name. With that record, I challenge my hon. Friend to say that there has been delay.

Sir W. Wakefield: I never complained in my speech of delay. I merely recorded the facts and did not complain of any delay whatever.

Mr. Noel-Baker: I am very glad. Others have. I challenge anybody to say that there has been delay and I challenge my hon. Friends who say that there has not been enough opportunity for any interested party to lay his case before the Minister and to make a claim and support it in any way desired. Of course, if anybody had asked for oral consultations we should have been more than glad to arrange them, but they were not asked for.

Captain Plugge: Does not the document which the Minister has read out show that those people did ask for an interview? Was it completely ignored?

Mr. Noel-Baker: It has been my experience that people are not very backward in asking for deputations when they want them. I would not like to say how many I have a week, but it is a considerable number. These organisations said they were
prepared to appoint a deputation.
They did not ask for it, and we did not think it was necessary, because we understood every single point that was made in their Memorandum.
Now let me come to the merits of the requests which were made by those five organisations and with which my Noble Friend has had to deal. There were four and they related to the length, width, height, and weight of road passenger transport vehicles. My hon. Friend only dealt with two of the four and he skated very lightly over the remaining two. I will tell the House why; because my Noble Friend agreed to the requests which were put forward with regard to height and weight. He accepted the requests that the height of single-decker vehicles should be increased from 10 ft. 6 in. to 15 ft. and that the weight should be increased from 12½ tons to 14 tons, with certain technical elaborations. Therefore, 50 per cent. of those demands had been accepted.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: The hon. Member who raised this matter did not mention that at all.

Sir W. Wakefield: I said that there were other matters, but the ones which

I raised, of length and width, were all-important for our export trade.

Mr. Noel-Baker: I do not think we can fight the next General Election on this occasion. I only mention that we accepted two out of four of the requests which were put forward, and I think my hon. and gallant Friend would have acted more fairly if he had mentioned it too. I come to the other two requests, and, first of all, to the request in respect of length. They wanted the permitted length of buses to be increased from 26½ ft. to 30 ft. for four-wheeled, two-axle vehicles. Let me deal for one moment with the point which my hon. Friend made about the three-axle vehicles, the vehicles with six wheels. He said that we had of course permitted 30 ft. for three-axle vehicles, and that nobody but a civil servant could have thought out the ingenious plan of allowing that while refusing 30 ft. two-axle vehicles. In fact, the relaxation was made because it was desired, at that time, for military reasons, to increase the production of three-axle vehicles. The thing was very closely watched, and in London those vehicles were restricted to certain routes. If the numbers had been greatly increased for normal civilian passenger traffic we should have had to control the whole thing, and, quite probably, we should have had to stop that relaxation altogether. There was a perfectly good reason, and the policy was justified in full.
What would happen if we increased from 26½ ft. to 30 ft. the permitted length of all public service passenger vehicles? On what ground is the request made? It is not made for the comfort of the passenger, not at all. It is not made to meet the needs of the conductors. The trade unions are all unanimously and vehemently against it. It is made to increase the pay-load, and to add to the number of passengers which can be taken by a single vehicle.

Sir W. Wakefield: Would not that be of considerable assistance in avoiding the congestion, which was one of the reasons for not allowing these vehicles on the road?

Mr. Noel-Baker: Not in the view of those who have to deal with the traffic, the highway authorities and the police. On the contrary; the great weight of opinion of those whom we have consulted


takes the view that it would increase congestion and would add to road accidents. Consider, if every bus that travels London were 30 ft., what would happen in the big congestions, for example, in Piccadilly or around Piccadilly Circus. What would happen when the buses with the three extra foot swing round a sharp corner and when they come to a narrow place to turn at the end of their routes? All those are very important considerations to which we are bound to give attention. The overwhelming weight of opinion of those whom we consulted was against this change. If Parliament in 1930, when it passed the Road Traffic Act, intended Ministers to consult those people it must also have intended that Ministers should take a little notice of what they said.

Mr. Alfred Denville: Can the Minister tell the House how it is that some Army vehicles can negotiate these corners? The "Queen Mary" tank carrier is 60 feet long. How does he reconcile his objection to 30 ft. buses?

Mr. Noel-Baker: I think my hon. Friend will agree that they greatly add to the congestion when they pass, and that war-time traffic is on a far smaller scale than peace-time traffic. I should not have liked to see a "Queen Mary" going down Piccadilly in the days of peace.
In regard to the request for greater width, I think the proposers made out a much stronger case than that concerning length. This proposal is one which affects the comfort of the passengers. In spite of what my hon. Friend says—and it has all been subject to very close technical examination—I understand that six inches extra width inside the bus would make a real difference. At present the seating allowance for each passenger in a bus is 16 inches. The average width of the passengers, at the relevant part of their anatomy, is 18 inches. Therefore it is evident that there must be an eight inch overlap into the corridor, which is already far too small. I think it is plain that to seated passengers, to standing passengers, and to conductors, the extra six inches would be of value. I admit it. It is also true that this would be of advantage for the export trade. We discussed the matter with my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of

Trade, and he has told us that in his view and so far as it goes the change would be to the advantage of the manufacturers in the export market. My Noble Friend has taken very full account of these representations in making the decisions he has announced. But he has decided that all the same he must reject the request, and he has done so on what seem to me to be very strong general grounds indeed.
Broadly, the case is this: Our roads both in town and country have been designed for vehicles not wider than seven foot six inches overall. Many thousands of miles of our roads in town and country—I have got a great deal of detail from our Divisional Road Engineers, but I will not weary the House with it—would be much less adequate for their job if there were a six inch increase in each of the vehicles which go along them. If every vehicle at Piccadilly Circus were six inches wider it would be a serious matter by the time one got across to the other side of the road. In many country roads two vehicles eight feet wide would have much greater difficulty in passing without collision, than they have to-day. My hon. and Gallant Friend says, "Widen the roads." I agree with the hon. Member who spoke last, who said we had better widen the roads before we widen the vehicles.

Mr. J. J. Davidson: It is perfectly clear to the majority of Members that my hon. Friend has answered adequately the arguments put forward by particular interests. There is an important housing Debate to follow in which Scottish Members are particularly interested——

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: It is not a point of Order for an hon. Member to try to limit someone else's speech.

Mr. Davidson: I did not rise to a point of Order. I rose to appeal to the Minister.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Then the hon. Member was out of Order in doing so.

Mr. Noel-Baker: I wish to meet my Scottish Friend's desire to get on with that Debate, but I have had a great number of matters put to me, some of which I did not expect, and as they are important, not only to my Ministry but to a very large public, I thought it was right for me to deal with them as adequately as I could. But I will now bring my


remarks to a conclusion. I think that the highway authorities, the police authorities and the others who urge that a widening of vehicles would cause increased congestion and would increase the number of accidents, have reason on their side.

Mrs. Hardie: Would it not be better to restrict private motoring instead of having us crushed up in buses? Personally I get bruised every morning.

Sir W. Wakefield: The Parliamentary Secretary never travels in a bus. He does not know.

Mr. Noel-Baker: I think I probably travel in buses as often as my hon. and gallant Friend. In answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Springburn (Mrs. Hardie) private cars are not seven foot six wide, and I have never heard of any manufacturer who asked leave to increase them to a greater width than that.

Mrs. Hardie: My point is that private cars cause congestion on the roads more than the buses do.

Mr. Noel-Baker: That is certainly true, and private cars are relevant to the discussion in another way which I shall mention. The decision was made by my Minister on a request relating to omnibuses alone, and I think I have satisfied the House that he was right. But as we expected, no sooner was the decision made than an organisation known as the British Transport Vehicle Manufacturers' Association came forward, at the beginning of December, with a demand that this should be given to all heavy vehicles including lorries. If my Noble Friend was right in relation to buses alone he is surely trebly right when the demand is made for an enormously increased number of vehicles. The hon. Member said that there were in the country many vehicles 8 feet wide, and that they are doing very well. There are 81 such passenger vehicles, mostly working in restricted areas under conditions of far less traffic than normal. If the hon. Member is quoting American vehicles, he must also admit that certain difficulties have arisen.
He also said we were doing irreparable damage to the export trade. But it was in the private car trade that our manufacturers did so badly in the world markets

before the war, and that trade is quite unaffected by this decision. In passenger and goods vehicles our manufacturers did incomparably better in the way of overseas markets. In their own memorandum they said to us that they were building up "a most valuable overseas market" before 1939. I think they may still have hopes of an overseas market, in spite of the decision my Noble Friend has made.

Sir W. Wakefield: This is very important. Does not the Parliamentary Secretary realise that American competition in this field will be very much greater, and it will be a good deal more difficult for our manufacturers, handicapped as they will be, to meet this competition? That is the whole substance of bringing forward this export trade difficulty.

Mr. Noel-Baker: Of course I have realised that. I have said that other things being equal this concession would be an advantage to the exporter, but other things are not equal. I say that, in spite of the Regulations the export trade will probably go on.
In reply to the hon. Member for Enfield (Mr. Bull) I would say, on right hand drive, that I agree with him about the attitude of the motor manufacturers. The change might help their exports, but they have made no request, and there is nothing else that I can say.

Mr. Bull: Would the hon. Gentleman make the suggestion to them?

Mr. Noel-Baker: I am afraid I cannot undertake to do that to-day.

Mr. Bull: Not to-day, but to-morrow perhaps, or next week, or in the New Year.

Mr. Noel-Baker: My hon. Friend the Member for Swindon ended by asking if we would receive a deputation and have a public inquiry. Of course we will receive a deputation, if the deputation think they have anything new or relevant to say. I would not like to encourage any hope that the decision will be changed. I have explained why. As for a public inquiry, it would be quite wrong for me to-day to accept that suggestion without giving it much more consideration, and having more consultation than I have been able to do at such short notice.

HOUSING (SCOTLAND)

3.28 p.m.

Mr. Buchanan: I wish to raise on this, the last day on which we shall meet this year, a question which I am perfectly certain my Scottish colleagues agree with me in regarding as not an important one. I make no apology of raising with the Secretary of State for Scotland to-day the question of Scottish housing. In these days one is apt, and possibly quite rightly so, not to give the same care and attention to domestic problems that would be given in a normal peace-time Parliament. Issues of war and peace are always with us, and because of their importance they outweigh our domestic issues. I wish to say at the outset that I doubt very much, speaking for Scotland as a whole, whether there is any issue, even in some respects the gravest issue of the war, rivalling in importance to the Scottish people the question of the provision of housing accommodation. Let any hon. Member go where he likes in Scotland. Let him discuss, if he cares, international policy, the treatment of Germany—all things that may be terribly important, and issues which played a dominating part in the election which followed the last war. But whether it be an industrial city or a country district he will find that to the Scottish people the dominating issue, the most appealing issue, is the issue of the housing situation in that country
I want to say a word or two about the background of the problem. I may be accused of repeating what is known, but in this Debate we have to make an appeal, not merely to the Scottish Members but to the larger part of Britain, to understand our situation; to make them realise why we feel so deeply about it, why we feel so bitter about it, why we ask for special treatment. Broadly speaking, among Scottish Members there is no difference of opinion about the clamant need. In Glasgow alone the need now is for at least 100,000 houses. When one recognises that to-day in the city of Glasgow, more than half the population—one citizen out of every two—has no lavatory accommodation but what he shares with other people—usually with four or five other families—and no bathroom accommodation, the position can be understood. Most of the families in our great cities, except for those who have been fortunate enough to get into municipal houses, bring

their children up to manhood without knowing the luxury and decency of having a bath at home. Consider our tenement dwellings; consider that in our cities, and in our towns and mining villages, and indeed in our agricultural areas, the single-apartment house abounds—one small place, without a lavatory, for a man to house his wife and family.
I am not going to quote a lot of cases to-day, but one of the things which remains in my mind is an experience of my brother during the last war. He was in the Navy. He had a single apartment for himself, his wife, and two children. When he was at sea, one child died, and in that little apartment his wife, for three days, was shifting the body from the bed to the floor, and from the floor to the table. The woman and the other child had to live with the dead body for three days. That was not in a slum; it was in a good district—God knows what happens in the slum districts.
I am serving on a Committee dealing with rents. When my colleagues were in the City of Glasgow I took them along a street called George Street, within three minutes' walk of our great City Chambers, to view our housing. One man who fought in the last war said that the horrors of that war were not any greater than the horrors of those housing conditions. That is the background, and it is growing steadily worse. Bear in mind, whatever may be said about the English problem and how we were able to grapple with it before 1939, that in Scotland our house-building, before 1939, was making little inroad. All that was being done was to keep up with what was passing out of use. There was little or no provision for modern needs. Five years of war have passed, with little or no new construction sanctioned, and the situation grows steadily worse. Every Member of Parliament ought to feel proud and happy when he goes to his Parliamentary division. I do not know if I am different from others, but when I walk down the streets of my division, I almost feel that the people are shrieking at me, wanting to know when they are going to get houses to live in.
The Secretary of State for Scotland must face the issue. It is not enough for him to say, "We are faced with a war, and with labour shortage." I say, frankly, to him that no man who ever occupied his office has received from the


House of Commons or from his Scottish colleagues the indulgence, almost kindness, that he has received. He has been treated to hardly a harsh term or hostile word. It is not like the old days, when he and I both sat in Opposition, almost tearing Secretaries of State limb from limb, in a political sense. He is favoured as few men have been. One reads of such Members as the hon. and gallant Member for Argyll (Major McCallum) pleading with him to reconsider his decision not to fight his seat again, one reads of the benevolence shown by almost everyone in the Conservative Party about his future welfare; and one reads how the hon. Member for the Western Isles (Mr. M. MacMillan), in the Scottish Debate a year or so ago, was almost fulsome in his praise. Those of us who dare even to look the wrong way at him, are looked at askance by our Scottish colleagues. That will not save him, despite his popularity, despite even the backing of the Press—although that backing is not too sure now, because the "Glasgow Herald" the other day, in a leading article, made a powerful plea for something more than has been done for Scottish housing—despite all I say to him, and despite what my colleagues may say and feel, despite all our niceness to him. Indeed, if this situation goes on, it will not save any of us.
The situation is ghastly, and something has to be done. The Secretary of State answered a Question the other day by the hon. Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil), which I apologise to the hon. Member for using. His answer showed how lamentable the position is. The hon. Member for Greenock asked how many houses have been built and occupied out of a programme of several hundred which were sanctioned for the beginning of 1943. Since then the whole of 1943 and 1944 has gone. Not 300 houses have been built and occupied—250 is the total. That is the total production after all this time. It is true that he mentioned, what I feel terribly, the flying-bomb attack on London; but, at the worst, the flying-bomb attack began only a few months ago. The right hon. Gentleman may produce other houses, and I am not going to take part to-day in a miserable quarrel as to whether he is right or the local authorities are right. I am not going to be the arbiter. All I know is that Scot-

land is not getting what it needs. If the local authorities are also to blame, the right hon. Gentleman must shoulder that responsibility, and come to the House and tell us. You get a situation in Glasgow, in which a miserable correspondence takes place about the right of two or three tradesmen to build a house. The Corporation writes letters to the Secretary of State for Scotland and there are consultations with other Ministries—a miserable correspondence without any relevance to the situation.
The Secretary of State for Scotland may say "What would you do?" Frankly, I am not too inclined to answer that question. After all, I am only a back bencher, I have never been entrusted with a trip abroad, but have only been entrusted with miserable committees, on which I am always having to fight. I once asked permission for my wife to go to Northern Ireland, and even that could not be granted. I do not know therefore that it is my responsibility, but I will try to answer the question if I may. What should be done? Two things need to be done now. One is to plan for the housing situation to-day, and the other is to plan to deal with it in the period immediately following the peace. What would I do now? I do not know if it is the job of the Secretary of State, but, first of all, I would say that priority No. 1 for labour, ranking with the most urgent public and Government work, should be house construction. As regards the transfer of boys, I say to the Secretary of State that I would put house-building in the same relation as the coalmines to the recruitment of labour. That is what I would make priority No. 1 now.
We are hearing a lot, and having deputations, about redundant workers in factories. Let me make this clear beyond a shadow of doubt. I would not make one shell more in this country than the country needs merely in order to keep men in work. Let us be frank about it. I would not keep a factory open merely to make shells. If redundant factories are being closed, even for a temporary period, even for a week, a month, or two months, during that period of redundancy transfers of labour ought to be made to the building of houses and articles required for the building of houses. If it is said that it is difficult, what happened to the difficulties in the war, the changes in shipbuilding and the transfer of men


backwards and forwards every day? Surely it can be done here? If my information is correct—and it has been published in a West of Scotland newspaper—one factory, in three months, has had 4,000 workers declared redundant. I say to the Secretary of State that he should lay claim to whatever labour he can get from that source for the purpose of building houses.
One other factor is that, for good or ill, men are returning home from the Forces. I think immediately of housing, and I say that every key-man in house building ought to be brought back as soon as possible to this country. He is valuable, apart from his own production and labour, because I want to see a great intensification of apprentice labour in the industry.
I speak of Glasgow because I know it best. Glasgow gets sanction for 300 houses, and, within a week or two, is given sanction for 400 or 500 more. What is this idea of the miserable parcelling out of little numbers of houses like this? As a matter of fact, there ought to be no limit to what Glasgow should build, even during the war. The Secretary of State should say to Glasgow, "I am placing no limit on you. If you can get materials and men, go on and build as many as you like." That is what the situation should be, but the right hon. Gentleman merely parcels out the houses in small numbers, and what happens? In house building certain classes of the work come to an end sooner than others. One man's job ends quicker than another's. If the man knows that there are only 300 to be built he does not hurry. He knows what is coming. In house building, of all occupations, you ought to be saying to the non-employed that there is another job ready to take its place as soon as the one is finished, and, in addition to that, you should always have a constant stream of houses to be built, ready for the transfer of men from one place to another, as their work finishes. This miserable parcelling out is no help to the situation.
I would say to the Secretary of State that, apart from better organisation and greater mechanisation of the industry, the two over-riding things in house building are labour and materials. I am going to ask the right hon. Gentleman what is being done now in Scotland to provide a greater pool of materials than

there is there now. Everyone knows in Scotland that the pre-1939 industry could not turn out the houses required, What is being done to increase the pool of materials? It is no use us discussing here how it is to be done unless we have some idea what is to be done to increase both the pool of labour and that of materials. What steps are being taken now by the right hon. Gentleman? Have there been any negotiations, and at what stage is he going to increase that pool? What effort is being made to release materials?
What I am about to say may anger people. I am as fond of the good things of life as ever a man could be, if I can get them. I have never got very many and I am envious of others who do. I see that shiploads of oranges are coming over. I am not against them coming over but with the Scottish housing situation as it is every available ton of shipping space should be used for the importation of timber for the building of houses.

Mrs. Hardie: Oranges are not a luxury but a necessity. Why pick on oranges?

Mr. Buchanan: The few oranges that working class children will get will make very little difference to them. As far as Scotland is concerned, the first thing to do is to get the material required for building houses. Nothing else can compare with that. I am not against temporary houses and I think that the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Works—whom I am pleased to see present at this Debate—helped to kill the Portal business. This was said to be a quick, easy way of getting houses and we thought that within a few weeks of the end of hostilities these houses would have been put up. None of us was very anxious about them, but the situation with regard to Scotland is becoming so serious that, although I do not want to see housing standards lowered, standards hardly matter. I would have taken on the Portal house, though not because I liked it. I knew that if it came to Scotland it would not be a temporary but a permanent house, but I had to accept it because the public made me, but even that is not to come now. We have been told that by the end of 12 months some of these houses might be built.
The Glasgow Corporation are going to carry out an experiment for the building of what are called foam-slag houses. They have asked for permission to erect a small factory and that permission has now been granted. The building of that factory ought to be a matter of urgency. If it had been required for the making of shells it would have been built within a week. The same urgency in the building of this factory should be shown now. I do not mind even temporary houses. I see that the Glasgow Corporation have produced a memorandum in which it is stated that a committee is to consider what open spaces or parts of the town can be used in connection with the erection of temporary houses. I think that, in that connection, something more might be done.
Just before the war they had one of the most stupid and useless things in that city called an Empire Exhibition, which occupied Bellahouston Park for years. It was one of the greatest wastages of public money of which I have ever heard in spite of what has been said by the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) and one or two others. It served little useful purpose. Surely to goodness if they could hand over one of the public parks for a stupid and useless venture like that, the same public park could be used in connection with the temporary housing of the people. The challenge to start building houses now is with the Secretary of State for Scotland. I am told that the war is in a serious stage, and I do not deny that fact. The war is with us and, like the river, it goes on. We cannot stop it, but some day a climax will be reached. But there is no man in Scotland who does not know that, if this housing position continues, its effect on the morale of the troops will be serious. The Government cannot afford to neglect it. The most pleading letters in one's postbag are from men in the Army pleading for homes in which to live after the war. I have sent one of the cruellest cases I have received to the Under-Secretary, who has acknowledged it with his usual courtesy. He is always courteous and so is the Secretary of State, and that is a thing which makes it difficult. In unessential things, they are kind; it is only when you ask for essentials that they say "No." This poor chap was in a military hospital, having lost an arm and a leg in Italy.

He is the father of three children and they all live in a single apartment, three storeys up, in the City of Glasgow.

Mrs. Hardie: Is that what he went to fight for?

Mr. Buchanan: This man minus one leg and one arm has to live in a single apartment and has to go up three storeys. He is more a prisoner there, than he would be in the hands of the Japanese. That is the sort of thing to which men are coming back. Their morale is being undermined. You have to do something; you have to do more than you are doing. It is no good saying that the Minister of Labour or some other Minister is to blame. There is only one Minister to blame, if blame has to be allocated. There the right hon. Gentleman sits. He is our Parliamentary representative; under our Parliamentary constitution, he is answerable. It is not for us to say anything about others. If others are to blame, he has a constitutional duty to perform. He must undertake it and I hold him responsible in these dark days. It is hard for those of us who live in the great miserable parts of the city. We have read of a miserable ballet written about Gorbals and how we live produced at a West End theatre. May I in conclusion say this. We have our faults and we have our failures but to-day in France, in Burma, in Italy, these folks are there with the others. If Scotland is worth anything, if this House of Commons is worth anything, it will not be judged in the future years by our victories abroad or even in war. The permanent test will be how happy and how decent we make the home lives of our people.

Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: I am sure that the House has listened, as it always does, with the greatest sympathy and attention to the case presented by my hon. Friend the Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) because he speaks of that which he knows and of his own city and his own country. It is a city which is well known throughout the world, and which, in spite of its grime, and in spite of its dirt, and in spite of its black furious quarrels, is very dear to those of us who, like myself, were brought up there and spent nearly all our lives there. But the case which is put to-day is not, of course, a case purely about Glasgow or purely about the West


of Scotland, and I and hon. Members from other parts of the country wish to put forward their claims. Therefore, I will do my best to limit what I have to say, although I do not think anyone could have wished the speech of the hon. Member for Gorbals to be shorter, short as is the time before us.
Since the Minister of Works is here and the Under-Secretary, who has spent so much time in the work of building, both practically and in theory—I would like to put to him one or two figures about the relative position of Scotland. Of course, those who are presented with the immediate problem of bombed London must feel that that takes a precedence from which there can be no escape, that the immediate damage of the destroyed cities in England, and more particularly the capital, far transcends the need for housing in Glasgow and in Scotland generally. I would like the Minister simply to consider this single figure—if I can have his attention for a moment—that if we compare the worst position in England with the position in Scotland, it will be seen how infinitely worse is the Scottish position than even those parts of England which suffered under the industrial revolution and which are bywords for slums. Take the great city of Liverpool, or places which have laboured long under a heavy depression, such as the county of Durham. To take the simple test a overcrowding, in Liverpool 7.4 per cent. of the houses are overcrowded according to the English standard; the percentage in Glasgow is 30 per cent.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Is that the last pre-war year?

Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: Yes, Sir, the last year for which we can get figures. Take the county of Durham, which is a colliery county, poor, and suffering very heavily from depression; the figure of overcrowding there is 12 per cent. The figure for the county of Lanark, similar in size and population and in industries, is 37 per cent.—three times as bad. That is the background from which we start, and I think that when a plea is being made that special attention should be given to the problem of Scottish housing, both in the allocation of labour and in the allocation of materials, we should say that even despite the great bomb damage in England, there are many ways in which the

Scottish housing situation, even without so much bomb damage, compares still very unfavourably with the position of England as a whole.
There is, of course, a very serious war situation, and nobody would suggest at the moment that you could diminish the Fighting Forces. I do not suggest that a comb-out of the Fighting Forces should be made, for this reason, that since the war began, a house in Britain has been destroyed or seriously damaged every half minute from September, 1939, until now, counting in the "phoney" war, counting in the absence of blitz over many parts—every 30 seconds from the beginning of the war until now a house has been destroyed or gravely damaged and, what is more, every half minute that the war goes on, that average may go on too. We shall never build houses as fast as that, and the first business of the Government must be to advance the end of the war. Just before the war broke out I said—and I remember people quarrelling with me then—that if the war came, it would make grave inroads upon the standard of living of the people of this country. That prophecy did not receive any very favourable reception anywhere, either in my own party or in the party of the right hon. Gentleman opposite. But it is true, terribly true, and the first necessity is to do everything we can to shorten the period over which that enormous wastage and destruction are going on, because no scheme of building that we can possibly plan will compare with the rate of destruction that the war is able to inflict upon the social standards and the amenities of our people.
But, having said that, then one must say that the position in Scotland is not a position which can be allowed to remain where it is. This is the sixth winter of the war and this winter is at the turn of the year. You cannot build any more for this winter. What I am worrying about is next winter. What we live in next winter will be what we build next summer. That certainly means that we shall have a very big problem before us in the allocation of manpower and materials during that time. Like the hon. Member for Gorbals, I am certainly not going into an argument between one local authority and this House. Certainly I have no reason whatever to tolerate the proposals which the Glasgow Corporation has made for dealing with this problem,


and I shall have no mercy upon them when it comes to be argued in the City of Glasgow or in meeting-places up and down the streets there. I think that the programme brought forward is paltry. I think that a programme of 5,000 houses a year with 30,000 suitable people clamouring for houses now, is a mockery to put before the people of this country. However, I think that the time for arguing that will be later, and in its proper place.
I say to the Secretary of State for Scotland that he has great administrative powers not merely over the recommendations of the normal programmes but over abnormal programmes. He has the Special Housing Association and it is supposed to be within its programme to build 100,000 houses. If it is a matter of persuasion and desire, if he has to ask, "Will you take some of these houses; will you give us sites on which to put them down?" people should not be asked to listen-in to a discussion of that nature. Glasgow has asked for 2,500 of these steel houses, yet there are 30,000 fit and suitable tenants for these houses, people with small families, newly married people. Ten thousand such houses would not be at all an unreasonable requisition to make in such case. Ten thousand houses would be something, and we show, at any rate, that the local authority were thinking big, thinking of something worth while. If the local authority does not make such an indent I think the Secretary of State must, and put those houses under the Special Housing Association, whether the local authority are concerned with the matter or not.
The hon. Member for Gorbals said, as was said by Members in the Debate on the English housing situation recently, that the question of the provision of steel houses had been killed by the suggestion that none would be provided until a certain number of months after the end of the war. The reason for that surely is that at the present moment there is an outpouring of shells and guns and steel plant of one kind and another, the potential of which will not become available till the end of the war and which cannot be used in any other way and which could be used for priority No. 1 which, as we all agree, is housing. Everything that can be got to reduce the terrible shortage of houses in Scotland should be used. Having been given the great weapon of the

Special Housing Association it is the business of the Secretary of State to ensure that it is used to the full whether a local authority says, "Aye," or, "No." The hon. Member for Gorbals rightly said that people would look to us here to see whether we have made adequate provision. If we say that we have refrained because of the amour propre of a local authority they will at first break into roars of laughter which will turn into a storm of curses.
These Debates tend to turn on the question of the long-term position. I am not so anxious about that because, frankly, we cannot see the long-term position. Yet the necessity for preparing and servicing every site we can in Scotland is very strong. There is at present an actual surplus of labour available for servicing sites in Scotland, which is not all being used by local authorities. That is a reproach; it is very nearly a scandal. I suggest that under the auspices of the Special Housing Association it might be possible to arrange an auxiliary servicing programme which could be used to take up a temporary slack which will not last for ever but which will be available, for a short time, and to deal with any area in Scotland where servicing is required. Servicing should go on whatever happens. It should never be possible for the Secretary of State, or anyone else, to say that there is a man available in Scotland at the present moment not being used to trench and prepare a site for a house. Let us hope that we shall be able greatly to enlarge the head of material that can be turned to the task of erecting houses on these serviced sites as soon as we can rid our hands of the very heavy commitments and mortgages of the war.
The hon. Member for Gorbals also spoke of the labour position and of the necessity of dealing with this matter as though it were a war problem, with which we all agree, in matters such as the extension of skilled labour which could be utilised for the purposes of construction. In the last Debate on housing the hon. Member used the word, "dilution." On that, the Secretary of State, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Works and right hon. Gentlemen and hon. Gentlemen opposite, are in the position of peculiar strength. They can bring forward proposals for dilution without the suspicion which would attach to them if


they were put forward by Members of other parties. There is a long history of industrial quarrel in Scotland and such proposals are looked on with frowns and suspicions. I did my best, as Secretary of State, to enlarge the labour potential which could handle these programmes, but I did not succeed. Here is a chance.
I have seen from the Press that the Secretary of State brought forward proposals that some use might be made of the skilled labour which is available in Scotland to-day, to deal with this problem on an auxiliary, a part-time basis, as a war emergency. This method has been used in Russia, and elsewhere, where great damage has taken place. In Greenock it has been proposed that skilled craftsmen—and many workers in that town are skilled in crafts analogous to the building crafts—could be utilised for the purpose of additional housing and be allowed to utilise their skill in those functions. What has happened about that? I would like the Secretary of State to give us an answer. Is there any prospect of that experiment being carried to a successful conclusion? I read that stormy arguments have taken place between my right hon. Friend and some of the authorities. The Secretary of State, as I remember in the old days, when he sat on the opposite side of the House, has a very rough side to his tongue, like any true Scotsman, and his powers of invective are as powerful as those of any of his formidable colleagues from the Clyde. I have suffered under the lash of all of them, and I am well acquainted with his power. The Press says that there was a stormy debate. But what was the result of that stormy debate? Have any auxiliary staff at all been put on to the great task of housing in areas like Greenock which are not merely short of houses, but which have suffered a great deal of bomb damage?
In conclusion, I would first urge my right hon. Friend to use his utmost endeavours to press the claims of Scotland in every possible way both for labour, material and any share of prefabricated houses that may be obtained. Such houses might be obtained in Europe or America. For instance, the Kaiser shipyards in California, the first of which was built, incidentally, by British money, are surrounded by a township holding at one time 90,000 people, nearly all of whom were housed in prefabricated houses.

Surely it might be possible to obtain a supply of prefabricated houses from there and elsewhere. Certainly, the need for prefabricated houses for the shipyards of Scotland, as well as other houses, is as great in Scotland as in any other part of the world where such houses have been erected.
Let me assure my right hon. Friend that he will have the unanimous and vociferous support of his colleagues in Scotland in any demand or request he makes upon the pool of labour or of material which is available. Secondly, I urge that we should not run a mile race as if it was a 100 yards race. This is the sixth winter of the war and next winter, whenever the conclusion of the war may be, will be the seventh under war conditions. A seven years war is a long war and you cannot run it on the basis of a sprint. Thirdly, I hope it will be possible for him to continue to press upon all concerned the present urgent need for some relaxation of the conditions under which the great peace-time organisation of labour was accustomed to operate and lastly, to say to local authorities that the House of Commons is deeply dissatisfied with the present position. In so far as local authorities can tackle it the House of Commons says "Go on, we put the responsibility on you." But also, you, the Secretary of State, must help and you must take a share in doing this yourself.
All these things are subject to the over-riding consideration of not weakening the Armed Forces or diminishing the number of men in the field—on this day of all, when we are told that girls have to be called up for service overseas. I will certainly be no party to calling up a girl of 21, sending her to France and bringing a soldier out of the line to weaken on balance the war effort, because every 30 seconds a house is being destroyed or seriously damaged since the war began. On all these grounds, our task is to make the utmost use of all available resources, and we look to the Secretary of State to see that a fair and adequate share is directed towards the country of which he is the Parliamentary representative.

4.22 p.m.

Mr. McNeil: No one will differ from the burden of the argument


that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman has made, but I do not think we could accept his premise that you will necessarily lengthen the war by taking men from the Services. It is surely plain that we have reached a stage at which production of the essentials for making war is being impaired by the appalling housing conditions. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman said that next winter we should be in the seventh year of the war and that we could not continue sprinting for seven years. He might have added that we have been extremely fortunate in the matter of the weather in the last four winters, and extremely fortunate that we have not had epidemic conditions in any part of the country. If we did have them, in the gross overcrowding which we know in the West of Scotland it would be a dreadful blow at our war effort. When we plead that men should be withdrawn from the Forces for this essential job, we, too, are thinking of the most effective way of shortening the war.
Could the Secretary of State tell us how far the allotment of temporary houses which he made some five or six weeks ago to local authorities is affected by the later statements that we have had in relation to Portal houses? It is incomprehensible to me that the right hon. Gentleman should have made these allocations and that within five weeks another Member of the Government should tell us that the Portal houses are right out of the reckoning. It is difficult to understand how, in such a short time, such a big difference could have taken place. There are, I know, five other varieties of temporary houses. I hope we may be told when, and in what proportion, we must expect these temporary houses to be delivered to local authorities.
Secondly, can we be told how the servicing of sites is going along? My right hon. Friend last Spring stimulated some of us, and I hope local authorities too, with his enthusiasm for the grouping of sites and transferring the engineering potential released from the air fields on to these sites. My impression—I hope it is hopelessly wrong—is that relatively little is being done after a great deal of talking. If it is the fault of the local authorities, the House should be informed whose is the fault. As far as Members on this side can aid him in his approach

to local authorities,I should not think he has any right to doubt the response. I hope I am wrong in my impression but I should like to hear factually the progress that has been made there.
Thirdly, can we be told a little about the attempts that have been made in temporary housing in my division and in Dumbartonshire? I believe from my own observation that it has been a complete failure. In my division 200 temporary houses were authorised some 15 months ago. So far, we have not got one house fit for occupation. It is very difficult to believe that this is a speedy way of solving our difficulties. I am told that the actual construction has been faulty and that makeshift repairs are now being attempted. I am also told that some non-ferrous pipes which were used have been a complete failure and have had to be replaced. Can we be told who was responsible for authorising the construction of these houses? I should like to be assured that the man who made such dreadful mistakes, is not the man who is authorising the other types of temporary houses with which I understand my right hon. Friend means to go ahead. I am not cavilling at any one person. I am only interested to ensure that a similar failing will not be repeated. To find after 17 months not a house fit for occupation makes it difficult to believe that this is a speedy method of creating temporary houses.
I now turn to the construction of permanent houses. I cannot overstress the importance of the confession which the Secretary of State makes in the figures that he gave us this week. It is not only that after 20 months only 167 houses are fit for occupation. It is worse than that. If I read the answer correctly, my right hon. Friend failed after 20 months to tell us what had happened about 58 houses of the first programme which do not yet seem to have been started. What has happened after 20 months that apparently tenders have not been made for 58 of these houses? Moreover, after nine months there are still 370 houses in the second programme not mentioned in the answer which my right hon. Friend gave.
I join with my hon. Friend the Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) in saying that I do not want to embarrass my right hon. Friend. I have frequently been in his debt and experienced a great deal of


kindness from him, and I have publicly admitted my admiration for him, but no one can be spared in an examination of this kind. There is nothing more important than that we should have these houses. There are, therefore, few things more important than that this House or, at any rate, this part of it, should understand the explanation behind the appalling failure to build houses in Scotland in the last 20 months. There are really only four elements concerned-contractors, local authorities, material and labour. There is no reason to believe that contractors are lacking in the sense of having an organisation. If the local authorities are failing in their job, we must be told. We have not been told that there is any shortage of material that cannot be overcome.
We are, I expect, to be told once more that labour is short. The last time we debated this and I pressed my right hon. Friend, he said that the question I had asked should be addressed to the Minister of Labour. I protest that that is not so. When my right hon. Friend urged Scottish local authorities to go ahead with their allocations under the first emergency programme and under the second emergency programme which we have had this year, either he had seen that the necessary labour was being made available or he was perpetrating a cheap, cruel fraud on the people who are waiting for houses. I do not say that heatedly; I say it measuredly. When my right hon. Friend came to the House last year and told us that we were going to have an emergency programme of 1,000 houses, I repeat that he ought to have satisfied himself that the labour was available for the programme, or he was not behaving with the administrative honesty which is usually associated with him. At Question Time, he pointed to the flying bomb, but I submit that that is not a sufficient excuse. That was not visited upon us until June this year. In my absence, following a representation from my division, my wife wrote to the Ministry of Labour on this subject, and in a letter dated 9th November, the Ministry of Labour said they had taken no people off the labour engaged on maintenance for bomb repairs in London. There may be a reason why Greenock should have been singled out for extraordinary treatment, but I imagine that the position is no worse there than it is in Clydebank or any other part of

Glasgow. I can understand the reluctance of the Ministry to transfer labour.
I ask my right hon. Friend to look again at some remarks I have made about the lag between the authorisation of a programme and the approval of tenders. I am certain—and I have already gone at some length into this subject—that this period, which is never less than three months, can be shortened. My right hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary has, I know, done some work on this subject, and perhaps we can be told now at what stage the work is and what progress has been made in persuading local authorities to accept a standard plan. If a standard plan is accepted could we have a standard schedule? What saving in time would this mean? My own impression is that, if we got a standard plan, the Secretary of State should be prepared to allot all the work direct to the contracting capacity available at the time, and that price should be agreed upon later.
May I add my plea to those of the two hon. Gentlemen who have already spoken upon the utilisation of labour which is now being labelled redundant? I am delighted to see the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour here. I have already had an informal discussion on this subject with him. In my division women are being taken out of factories which we understood were being engaged on work of a high priority. They are now being directed outwith my division to work which I am prepared to discuss more fully and which, I am certain, is not of such a high priority. Why cannot these women be used to release male labour from marine engineering and from shipbuilding so that such labour could be turned onto house building? I know the difficulties and I sympathise with my right hon. Friend, but is he persuaded that no ancillary use can be made of this skilled and eager labour, labour which has already offered itself in such districts as my own, for this purpose?

4.37 p.m.

Mr. Erskine-Hill: The hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) and the hon. Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil), who are respected by the House for their sincerity, have painted a strong picture of the seriousness of the housing position. I do not think that they have exaggerated it in


any way, because the situation in the east of Scotland is every bit as bad as that in the west. I could mention many cases in my own constituency of the same sort as the hon. Member for Gorbals put so forcibly. I have taken tea with a family of 14 people living in a two-roomed house, with no bathroom and with only the joint use with other tenants of lavatory accommodation. While we have a situation of that sort, how can we have family decencies and families growing up with the chances that every citizen ought to have? I would endorse what the hon. Member for Greenock has said, that the situation is of the first priority and, I believe, is more important than the problem of employment. History will repeat itself, and after the war, for a time at least, there will be employment. There will be maladjustments in the turning over from war-time to peace-time work, but, taking it by and large, the troubles of unemployment are not likely to reach us for several years after the war.
What is the growing problem now, and what is the problem that will become the most urgent We have ever had to face in peace time? It is the problem of what we are to do with our people when they come back from serving us so well abroad. My right hon. Friend the Minister of Works, whom we are all glad to see here, and who has taken on an extremely difficult job, in which we all wish him well, put the problem the other day in his speech in the Debate on the Gracious Speech. He then said:
We have got to produce the largest number of dwellings of a reasonable standard, if not in time at any rate, in the shortest possible time; because in the face of this situation, I do not think we can 'kid ourselves' that we can solve this problem, with all the arrears we have to make up, in time."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th December, 1944; Vol. 406, c. 815.]
My right hon. Friend has taken on an extremely difficult job. He has not, by any means, exaggerated the position, and what the House expects of him is to see that steps are taken at once to solve this problem. Lord Kelvin used to say that you had first to measure a problem and that that was more or less easily done; the real trouble and difficulty arose when you came to solve it. I agree with my right hon. Friend who has just said that we must use every type of house and every type of building method. You

must stop at nothing. You must be prepared even to do patchwork, when you would very much rather make a unified scheme. This House still has the duty of pressing upon the Secretary of State for Scotland that he should choose the type of house which will best help towards reaching a solution more quickly. Upon that matter, I would say that, like many other hon. Members, I paid a visit to Northolt the other day and I was very much taken with one class of house. I think my right hon. Friend's Ministry is to be congratulated both upon that exhibition and upon that extremely good publication called "Demonstration Houses." It shows how the houses that we saw differ in the time they take to build.
Time is much more of the essence of this problem than is finance at the moment. I would draw the attention of the House to the particular type of building which is called the Northolt Block. I think it is No. 7. The tables of figures which I have here set out the facts that it occupies 900 square feet and that it takes 900 building-labour-hours to put up. That is much less than any of the other houses. The house is strongly spoken of in this book, but it is regarded only as an example of those which are multiple-produced. Could not this form of house be made use of in order to cope with the acute shortage of labour which will face us at the end of the war? The cost of the house compares favourably with that of the others. I notice that the no-fines concrete house and the slag concrete house each has only 850 square feet, costs more and requires more than double the building labour hours to put up.
That is the type of house which the Secretary of State for Scotland ought to bear in mind. Hon. Members will recall that it is a two-storey building, with two flats. The bottom floor has three bedrooms and a dining sitting room and in the top floor there are four bedrooms and a dining sitting room. That sort of house will be exceedingly useful. I believe that is the sort of house which will be suitable for Scotland, and I ask the Secretary of State to give his full attention to adapting it. The House will remember that the Minister of Works told us on a recent occasion that there will be no pressed steel available for the Portal house till the end of the war. Will it be possible for us to have the steel framework for the houses


I have described, and to start putting up some of them before the end of the war? We cannot leave this thing as though it were something which we can afford to leave. It is one of the most important war priorities. The struggle of this country will not be terminated by the end of the war with Germany. We shall have our difficulties and we must give priority in some way to this matter.
Something has been said about the Tarran house. I was not in the House when the Minister gave an answer to a Question on the subject and if it appeared in HANSARD I have missed it, and I apologise. I would like to ask the Minister whether the Tarran houses are being built in Scotland. I support what has been said about the urgency of the Tarran house. There are three economies—I use the word in its widest sense—which we all have to watch. There is the financial problem, which is the essence of the matter. Local authorities ought to know as soon as possible the extent of the subsidy they are to have and what the plans of the Government are. Free enterprise ought to know also. I am very hopeful that free enterprise, even in Scotland where conditions are more difficult than in this country, can still play a useful part, if given a chance. I expect that whoever is Secretary of State will give free enterprise a fair chance to co-operate in this urgent problem, which affects us all. It ought not to be a party matter at all. Just as when we are faced with a national emergency in war-time we all try to work together for the national good, so with the housing question. We should put it above party altogether. Those who are deeply interested in the national welfare should be willing to co-operate in every way to get forward with the solution of this problem.
I would like to say a word upon another important matter. Houses have been condemned much too often in the past, and demolished when they might more easily have been restored, have been made quite as good as new houses. I can give an example from my own experience. I had a small cottage on the farm which I have at home. It dated from the year 1715. Our factor told me it was thought to be in a very bad condition and that he was going to condemn it. I took the first steps to see what could be done to that house. With reasonable expenditure, it was made serviceable again. Then I was

told by the local authority that it was a better house than any which had been built in recent years. I believe that too much demolition has been going on, and I would ask the Secretary of State to see that, at this juncture, no houses are condemned until the situation is such that everyone has a roof, or until no other way can be found.
I believe in a high standard. I liked the Portal house, not because I thought it was a particularly high standard of building but because there were gadgets in it which will make for the comfort of the housewife and the family. I should like to see that sort of gadget put into all the houses that are built. I think we shall have to face up to building flats, rather in the American way. The situation will be so grim that it will be a question, not of having just what everybody would like but of tackling the real problem. If larger blocks could be put up, there would be many conveniences which would more than make up for the loss of such benefits as there are in isolated houses. It would save an enormous amount of land and modern systems and arrangements could be made possible, such as the supply of hot water and heating facilities, all at a very moderate cost. I think they would commend themselves to the people of this country, many of whom prefer, particularly in cities, to live near their work. Considerable economies will be possible in connection not only with the building sites but the houses themselves.
Like the hon. Gentleman the Member for Gorbals, I am a back-bencher. We feel responsible for the situation. We realise that the House of Commons cannot, even if it wanted to, get away from its responsibility. We shall continue to press the present Secretary of State, and any Secretary of State, that justice should be done to the people of our country of Scotland, and that we shall let nothing go by until we have achieved comfortable houses for all.

4.50 p.m.

Mr. Sloan: Any stranger listening to this Debate would wonder where he was, because every speaker on both sides of the House is desirous of seeing houses built in Scotland, and of bringing pressure to bear upon the Secretary of State, who after all is the prime mover in this matter, and who must, as stated, take his share of


responsibility for any lack of houses. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Kelvingrove (Lieut.-Colonel Elliot) told the Secretary of State that he had great responsibility and great power. But the housing problem in Scotland is not of to-day's making. It was an acute problem when we had no labour problem. The only labour problem we had in those days was to get people work, and there was no scarcity of materials.

Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: Does the hon. Member really wish to contend that? We have had this out before, but if he thinks there was no shortage of housing labour in Scotland before the war, then he will not find any confirmation of that from the right hon. Gentleman the Under-Secretary who sits there.

Mr. Sloan: I was merely making a passing reference. There was certainly an abundance of labour and material, but no houses.
It is not long since we last had a Debate on housing. If we could produce houses in conformity with the number of Debates we have we should settle the housing problem in a very short time. During the last Debate we had the Secretary of State told us a sunshine story, which I hope he will not repeat, because in doing so he is merely, as the hon. Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil) has already said, raising hopes in the minds of the people outside which will evidently not be justified. I remember the right hon. Gentleman opening the Debate by stating that overcrowding in Scotland was six times higher than in England; that infantile mortality was very much higher than in England, and that tuberculosis was gravely on the increase. He attributed at least a fair share of this to the state of housing in Scotland. He then went on to raise the hopes of the people of Scotland that this housing problem would be tackled in earnest.
Whatever else may accrue from the Debate this afternoon it has been abundantly proved that there is no prospect whatever, if things remain as they are, of the housing problem in Scotland being tackled. Local authorities are very anxious about the matter. They are perturbed about the position. They have lists of applicants on their books, and

they are telling applicants, "Do not come near us, because we have no room for you." The burgh of Ayr has made it clear that there is no chance whatever of houses, and I think Glasgow Corporation has said that nobody with less than 10 years' residence in the city need make application for a house. That is a very serious position, a very serious problem indeed, and I hope the Secretary of State will be able to tell us something about the prospects of housing the people.
My own experience is general to every Member. I had a letter this morning from a man in Burma who is anxious about the position of his wife, who is dependent on relations to house her. Every Member is having the same experience. What reply can we give them? What answer can we make? One is afraid to sit down to write a letter because one does not know what answer to give to the people. Before I left Ayrshire at the beginning of this week I had a deputation of three women who were forced to go into a house that had been cleared. They still had to pay rent, and rates are again to be charged. Water is running down the walls, and when the Afton rises, the floor is flooded. They step out of the bedroom in the mornings into two or three inches of water on the floor of the house. What answer can I give to such people? They go to their local authority member, they come to Members of Parliament, and the difficulty is to know what kind of answer to give them. One does not know what to say. All one can say is that there is not the slightest prospect of providing them with a house for many years to come.
The Secretary of State must accept his responsibility in this matter. I am beginning very much to doubt this power of the Secretary of State for Scotland. I am beginning to doubt very much whether this present organisation of ours is any use at all, because we always come at the tail end. We have an English housing Debate in this House, and every principle is settled. Then we come on at the tail end and have a sort of rehash of what has taken place in the English Debate. But whether it be England or Scotland, this is a problem that must be faced. I am not at all convinced that we cannot find labour to build houses. If we want labour for anything connected with the war we get it. The Minister of


Labour directs, and, willy nilly, people have to go and do the job. Housing ought now to become a first priority, and there should be the possibility of people being directed to house building by the Minister of Labour.
Like the hon. and learned Member for North Edinburgh (Mr. Erskine-Hill), I have looked at the demonstration houses at Northolt, and I also paid attention to the house which he has already mentioned that can be erected in 900 man-hours. Surely here is a practical demonstration of what can be done in 900 man-hours. We must not under any circumstances allow our housing to be dealt with as it was formerly—to be unable, after the scheme has been undertaken, to get the workmen out of it or to get the people in. Some method must be adopted whereby the house building will be done very much more speedily and effectively, so that we shall be able to march a little way along this very wearisome road. I would like to draw the attention of the Secretary of State, and the Minister of Works also, to the present type of house that is on view. A mistake was made in the construction, and it was erected with an eight-feet instead of a 7ft. 6in. roof. Surely this mistake must have been an act of Providence. With all the difference in the cost that there can possibly be, consideration should be given to the raising of the roof by this extra six inches. If you go from one type of house to another, the difference is so great that I cannot understand why the Ministry persists in having the 7ft. 6in. roof as compared with the eight-feet roof.
The arguments that have been used are all very well, but, unless we are going to have some active progress, some determination behind this housing drive, by a nation which has spent £25,000,000,000 on war, and not scrupled to spend the few million pounds which are necessary to build houses, we cannot deal with the problem. A nation that has gone into so much research in order to produce the best implements of war, that has had no hesitation about scrapping instruments if they failed to meet the situation and to put the scientists, the back-room boys, on the job, should not hesitate to put the same amount of drive into housing. In Ayrshire, we are faced with a terrible position. I can see the difficulties of the large towns. I have no doubt that the cities, with their teeming millions,

have serious housing problems. When one sees the horrible slums, one can understand the feelings of people coming from those areas; but let us not forget that the rural districts also have their problems, that the villages and small towns have their problems, that in the County of Ayr we have serious problems that we do not know how to solve unless there is to be a great drive forward in the erection of houses. I hope that the Secretary of State will be able to tell us what progress he intends to make and that he intends to give instructions to the local authorities as to how they shall proceed, and the result will be that many houses which are so badly needed will spring into existence.

5.5 p.m.

Mr. Snadden: I always enjoy listening to people who know what they are talking about, and I think that that can be said of every hon. Member who has spoken in this Debate. Each of them impressed me with his profound knowledge of the chronic disease we are discussing this afternoon, a knowledge which is derived only from long experience and close contact with it. In dealing with the countryside I cannot hope to reach the same high standard, but, after having lived for over 20 years in my constituency, I know that we in the countryside have our terrific housing problem also. It is perhaps not so obvious as that of the towns; and the reason very often is that our cottages are camouflaged by the wonderful beauty around them—at any rate, in the part of the country where I happen to live. But it is no exaggeration to say that our problem is just as acute, and just as urgent, as that of the towns. In the two counties where my constituency lies, Perth and Kinross, there are scores of miserable hovels, I am ashamed to say, which are quite unfit for human habitation. Many of them are completely hidden, and it is only after close investigation that one discovers them at all. But they are a menace to the health of the people and an almost insuperable obstacle to agricultural expansion and to rural well-being. There is no need to attempt to over-paint the picture. Anyone who has read the excellent report of the Scottish Advisory Committee on Rural Housing will find, on page 42, the statement:
No section of the population is compelled to live in such consistently bad housing con-conditions as farm servants.

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: That is just an analysis. We have had the analysis for 25 years.

Mr. Snadden: That was the report in 1937. If that was true in 1937, what the position is to-day can only be imagined, because we have had nothing done since the report was issued. There is before the Secretary of State the most prodigious task, both in town and country, which has ever confronted any Secretary of State for Scotland in our history. As the hon. Member said just now, the people are bitter. I know that in my constituency that is so. As a nation we have paid a stiff price in disease, bad health and rural de-population. It is often said that the deplorable conditions of our rural housing is due to the wilful neglect of the private owner. Here and there, I admit, that is true; but the main cause, undoubtedly, is the prolonged agricultural depression over the past half-century. You cannot have a live housing policy in a lifeless and hopeless countryside—which is what we have had. Everyone who knows the land will admit that, except in war, agriculture has never had the opportunity to prosper, never had the opportunity to achieve maximum efficiency; and until it gets that opportunity, it is no good talking about good efficiency. For half a century it has laboured under a policy of restriction. Cheap food has not meant the abolition of want, the abolition of unemployment, the abolition of malnutrition, or the abolition of bad housing. I do not think it would be difficult to argue that it has aggravated all four.
We are told—and I see that the Under-Secretary who deals with agricultural affairs is in his place—that the countryside after the war is to be given its opportunity. That means more cultivation. Cultivation means more labour, and, if we are to see the enormous expansion of the milk industry, which seems to be almost the only certain thing in the agricultural field at the moment, we shall need still more labour there, too. It is not only a case of replacing existing dwelling for rural workers, but also of building new dwellings to cope with the extra labour required after the war.
I will put, in the form of questions, one or two points which the right hon. Gentleman may care to answer when he comes to reply. First, what are the total rural

housing needs in Scotland? I have never seen a figure quoted, and, if the right hon. Gentleman has that information, and will go a litle further, perhaps by publishing it and showing the county distribution, I shall be very much obliged. The second point I wish to make rather follows upon a remark of one of my hon. Friends on the other side. It is this: What is being done about sites? We know, in the country, that land is being acquired, but is that all? What about the servicing of the sites with roads, drainage and electricity where it is available? I do not know of anything in my constituency that is being done towards the servicing of these sites. I do not know whether that is the fault of the local authority or of the Department of Health, but I would like my right hon. Friend, if he can, to make available to the county councils the necessary labour to get on with the servicing of these sites.
My third question is in connection with the small country builder. In my part of the world, we are very anxious about him, because we believe his services will be vital to the solving of the housing problem in the rural areas. He has lost most of his labour, which has been directed into the army or elsewhere, and I would like an assurance from the right hon. Gentleman that these small builders, who have a very big understanding of local conditions, are going to be given their opportunity to co-operate in this attack upon housing. With all the priorities in the hands of the State, what chance is the private builder to have?
My last point is in connection with the policy of the tied house, or, as some hon. Members may better understand it, the siting of farm cottages. I understand that it is Government policy as far as possible to build these cottages in existing villages. There are strong arguments in favour of this policy, and anyone who knows anything about agriculture will realise that the tied house has very great disadvantages. Although the landlord is responsible, the farmer really controls the house, and the worker does not like kicking up a fuss with the farmer because he thinks he may lose his job. Another reason is the lack of social amenities and educational facilities in rural areas. We know that, in England, the tied house system is fast disappearing, but I would like to throw out a word of caution. Scottish condi-


tions are vastly different from English ones. Our farms are not as close up to the villages as is the case in England. They are strung out over great stretches of country, and we have a far more rigorous climate. Men do not like cycling, on a winter morning with snow on the ground, several miles to their work, and they do not like remaining wet all day. In the case of certain houses built in the county of Perth for agricultural workers there is difficulty in letting them. Workers do not like this business of travelling long distances to work. Sometimes in planning we tend to forget the feelings of those we plan for.
The most important argument of all in favour of caution in regard to the elimination of the tied house is that of the future of the agricultural worker. Anyone must know that, when children are reared upon a farm, they get to know many things about farm work. The small child, going out with his father, gets to know about cows and cultivation. He learns many other things, and these children are the future agricultural workers of Scotland. If you take them away and put them in the villages, even though they may gain certain other facilities, my experience is that they are lost to agriculture. So I throw out the warning to my right hon. Friend to be cautious in his policy about building cottages far away from the farms. Surely it should be possible for the local authorities to build these farm cottages on or near the farms where they are required.
I hope the right hon. Gentleman, when he replies, will give an assurance to those of us who live in the rural areas that these people, who have done a very good job in this war—a drab and not very spectacular job, but, nevertheless, a very sound job—are to receive the same treatment as the people who live in the towns and cities.

5.17 p.m.

Mr. McGovern: I do not think it necessary to tell the Secretary of State for Scotland the effect of evil housing conditions, either in Glasgow or any part of the country, because he receives individual complaints, and the information conveyed in accumulation of those complaints, and by hon. Members in every part of the country, is supported by his Department's medical advisers. I think there are two elements in this

Debate. There are those who demand speedy and effective action art once, and there are those who are acting in a little stage play, and are attempting to ride two horses at the same time.
The right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Kelvingrove (Lieut.-Colonel Elliot) gave his case away in one little sentence. There are two points on which I would like to cross swords with him. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman said, in regard to the neglect of housing in the past, that there was not the labour. There was a shortage of plasterers. If there was a shortage of labour then, what is the position now during a war? If there is a shortage during a period of peace, surely there must be a much more effective scheme for a period of war? But there were many houses constructed in Scotland that required no plasterers at all. They were the steel houses. I say that all the previous Secretaries of State have failed in their duty to solve this problem of housing, and also that the free enterprise and the private interests we hear so much about, are in the dock for all time as being responsible for that lamentable failure and are the cause of the present tremendous housing shortage in England and Scotland.

Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: As the hon. Member has challenged me, would he also say that the local authorities stand in the dock, including the Socialist majority on the Corporation of Glasgow, where housing failed as well? If so, that would include the hon. Member himself being placed in the dock, for the period before the war.

Mr. McGovern: The right hon. and gallant Gentleman can shift his responsibility on to somebody else, but I say this—I would have been prepared even to have forgiven the Labour Party majority on the Glasgow town council for any other failure, if they had gone ahead energetically to solve the housing problem, which strikes at the root of almost the whole of the evils of working class life to-day. However, I am not here to give advice. The only thing we can ask the Secretary of State for Scotland is, What information is he going to give to the House to-day? The right hon. and gallant Member for Kelvingrove said that he would not take away one single building trade worker if it would weaken the war effort. Surely,


he is giving away the whole case for an immediate drive for the construction of houses. We are told now, or the public are made to believe, that the only person who is responsible is the Secretary of State for Scotland. All the parties and all Members are demanding house construction now, and he is said to be the only man standing in the way.

Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: Where did the hon. Member get that idea?

Mr. McGovern: I got it from the fact that various parties have been demanding immediate action in the construction of houses. I am not in this at all. The nation and the political parties have taken the view that it is more important to kill Germans and Japanese, than to save Britons. I do not hold that view. I think that housing is more important than war, and that war is only a consequence of the lack of decent conditions among people all over the world. Free enterprise and private interests over a long period of time, have given us this tremendously evil thing of slums and of bad houses, which are tumbling down in thousands in various cities because they are too bad to be propped up in a decent manner. Bugs and rats and all kinds of vermin are destroying the opportunities for people to live in decency.
It is no good members of the Tory Party coming here, as one Member said in this House, with faces like prostitutes at a christening, and trying to make us believe that they are the people who have been striving all the time for the improved housing of the people and that we have been standing in the way. Toryism is to be condemned in regard to housing as well as war, and every problem that humanity has thrown up at the moment. The Secretary of State for Scotland, if he is to be perfectly honest in his statement, has to show whether he is the man who is holding persons back in this country from constructing houses. Here is a letter from a doctor in my own area. The Secretary of State has placed one tubercular patient in an institution during the last week or two. This letter says that Miss Margaret Fisher, who has been suffering from pulmonary tuberculosis, has been waiting for a bed for two months. Her sister died a year ago after waiting at home for six months. The doctor says the position is scandalous and that it is

not an isolated case by any means. This is in my area—two members of one family in a small house. That is the result of Toryism, which had no concern for the people in the last century, and of people who lived by high rents and scandalous exploitation of the hovels that these people lived in.

Commander Galbraith: Is the hon. Member aware that, in Glasgow alone, there were 19,000 empty houses in 1914, whereas to-day there is a shortage of 100,000, and that that shortage is a result of private enterprise being put out of the market altogether?

Mr. McGovern: The opportunity for the State to go into housing only came when private enterprise could not make a profit out of it, and when people could not pay high rents. The landlords held the nation by the throat, and it then became the job of the nation to subsidise houses to enable people to live in decency. I could give a very long discourse this afternoon, if time permitted, on housing and the putting into the dock of people who are responsible for the present tragic state of affairs. But I intend, at this late hour, only to say to the Secretary of State for Scotland, that the people want houses to be constructed. If the local authorities are straining at the leash, why is he stopping them all from building houses? And why should he accept responsibility for all this? The hon. Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil) talked of some political fraud. He is about as great a political fraud, going about as a young man who does not put on the uniform that many of his constituents have to don. That is the kind of humbug to which the hon. Member's constituents have to listen.
I would ask, What kind of houses, and how many, are to be built within the next year? I know many in the Forces who have been five years in the field and will have to come back without a house to accommodate them. I would like to see the houses constructed and the end of talk. If there is a possibility of the houses being built, when are they to be begun and when will they be ready for occupation?

5.28 p.m.

Sir Henry Fildes: Everybody who has anything to do with Scot-


land and any knowledge of housing conditions, knows that there is a terrible shortage of houses. I am intervening in the Debate for one main reason. Our hope is the Secretary of State for Scotland. He has formed Committees and has all the information, and I have been disappointed beyond measure to find that it is not his intention to contest the next election. I would like to see him come back here to see the job through. He could put his time to no better use. I am convinced that, whatever he may do in other walks of life, if he could stand up in Scotland as the man who solved this question, the gratitude and appreciation of his own fellow countrymen would resound to his dying day. He should see this job through.

5.29 p.m.

Major Lloyd: As one who has rejoiced throughout the discussion in the high standard of clarity and purpose which all the speakers, save one, have been most careful to show, I would like to say how much I deplore the fact that the hon. Member for Shettleston (Mr. McGovern) broke that high standard and indulged in an orgy of pure party venom. The Secretary of State for Scotland has appealed to those of us who are Members for Scottish constituencies to do our utmost to establish unity if we really want to get things done. Everyone of us has given lip service to and has a sincere appreciation of the truth of that remark. He also said, "Let us make up our minds upon subjects on which we will not enter into a welter of party politics." This is not a party political question, it has not been in the speeches from any quarter of the House, except in that of the hon. Member for Shettleston.

Mr. McGovern: That is the humbug of it.

Major Lloyd: I think it is deplorable, this attempt to drag party politics into this quite terrific problem, with which all of us are so deeply concerned, and which we are determined, if we possibly can, by unity and pressure in every direction, to do something about in the immediate and more distant future. It is a tragedy that this great problem should have been besmirched by a speech of that character.

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: Can my hon. and gallant Friend say whether what is really an age-long dispute in Scotland with regard to private and municipal enterprise there is dead, because I think it is just as much humbug to say it is dead if it is not?

Major Lloyd: I cannot see any reason whatever why any hon. Member should suggest it is a dispute between private enterprise and municipal enterprise. No one on this side has said it. All that there would be any dispute about, as far as I know, is why all those who can and will build houses should not be given an opportunity to do so. That is all we want—as many houses as we can get—and we want to employ every resource that we can possibly mobilise for that effort. Therefore, to suggest, from political prejudice, the ruling out of one particular agency for producing houses is, in my opinion, gravely to jeopardise the future housing problem in Scotland.

Mr. McGovern: I do not care who produces them as long as they are produced.

Major Lloyd: I am glad to hear the hon. Member say that, because that is my whole contention to-day. I feel rather strongly about this, and I have a feeling that this House is in danger of placing too heavy burdens upon the local authorities in connection with housing. I am becoming increasingly worried about it. We are giving them tremendous responsibilities and placing the heaviest possible burdens upon them, and there is a feeling that we have to some extent shifted the burden from our own shoulders on to theirs. If that is so, it is not "fair do's". We are in some danger, in my humble opinion, of breaking the backs of the local authorities over this problem and then of turning round and trying to blame them. We ought to use every agency that we can, not only because we want all the houses we can get, but because we do not want to put too heavy a burden upon the local authorities on whom, at the moment, all our legislation is concentrated.
Let us remember that all subsidised houses, I think I am right in saying this, are at present to be built for the working class—which has never been properly defined. We are now utilising, thank goodness, another agency. I want to congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secre-


tary of State for Scotland, who has not had too many bouquets this evening, upon the enthusiasm which he has put into developing, strengthening and encouraging the Special Housing Association. I set great hopes by that organisation, because I believe it can do a lot to build houses for the working classes. We have now agreed to a subsidy for the Special Housing Association, we have given it almost equal facilities with the local authorities, and I am glad that the Secretary of State is, as it were, a godfather to that organisation, because it will supplement the work of the local authorities.
I would urge my right hon. Friend to sympathise with my argument that we are in danger of breaking the back of the local authorities. With the best will in the world, with all the enthusiasm they can muster, they have no direct, special qualifications for this task. It is a vast undertaking and there is the temptation, to some of them at any rate, to recollect that they will be adding to the burden on their rates. I want to use all resources, all agencies. Let us encourage the Special Housing Association. I would like the Secretary of State to spare a moment or two in his reply to say what he is doing to facilitate the Special Housing Association to an even greater degree than in the past. I hope it will have compulsory powers, because, as far as I can understand it, it may ask permision of a local authority to put other houses in the area and, if difficulties are raised by the local authority, that area may not get those houses. I hope that the Secretary of State will ask us, if necessary, for still greater powers for the Special Housing Association, whose work for housing is of the greatest possible importance.
I do not see how the local authorities, the Special Housing Association, private enterprise and the Building Trade Association come into this picture at the present moment. I have a feeling that all the priorities for labour and materials are going elsewhere, and that would be a pity. We hear a lot from public platforms of equality of opportunity. Let us have it here too—equality of opportunity for all who are able to build houses. That is not a bad motto and I suggest that it be taken into consideration seriously by all who have to deal with this great

problem. Equality of opportunity in priorities for labour; equality of opportunity for priority in materials; equality of opportunity in subsidies too, provided the subsidies are used in the right way for the benefit of the poorer classes of the community, who otherwise would not be able to pay the normal economic rents.

Mr. J. J. Davidson: Is the hon. and gallant Gentleman suggesting that the Special Housing Association, which is a non-elected body, should have compulsory powers to override the decisions of an elected local authority?

Major Lloyd: I think my hon. Friend is trying to drive me further than I intended. I want to suggest that if there was any reason of prejudice, if, for instance, the Secretary of State were thoroughly dissatisfied with the reason given for refusing the Housing Association the right to build in any area, he should be empowered to authorise the Association to build there. That was really what I meant by compulsory power.
Another point I want to mention is in connection with the building trades organisation. They, I gather, feel rather strongly that during the temporary emergency and the great restriction of labour and materials all house-building operations could be expedited if competitive quotations were temporarily suspended and standardised schedules of prices were fixed by agreement with all concerned, not merely among themselves but with the local authorities and the Secretary of State in conference. It should not be difficult to reach agreement on a schedule of prices. If that were done, so the Building Trades Association believes, it would mean that many small builders would be able to participate in the housing programmes of local authorities and others to a degree which, at present, they fancy they may not, as they feel they may be ruled out by the big man being able to quote somewhat lower than the standard price. I understand they have asked the Secretary of State whether he will consider the proposal. I quite appreciate that it could not possibly be considered except in the light of complete agreement amongst all the parties, but it seems a reasonable proposal, at least for consideration, and I gather that they await a reply.
I think we have had a helpful discussion to-day, and that we are fortunate in having a Secretary of State who is in such complete sympathy with all our points of view. He is doing his utmost with this terrific problem, and it would be unfair to rend him because progress is extremely slow. Further, I hope that because things are slow unscrupulous people will not bring party politics into the consideration of this problem of housing our people in Scotland.

5.40 p.m.

Mr. Thomas Fraser: First I want to say how much I regret that the hon. Member for Shettleston (Mr. McGovern) took advantage of this Debate to make such a vicious attack on my hon. Friend the Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil). It was utterly unjustifiable that he should have used my hon. Friend's attack on the Secretary of State to make an attack upon my hon. Friend himself because he was not, at his age, in His Majesty's Forces——

Mr. McGovern: Surely in the Parliamentary arena I can compare one action with another. There is nothing wrong with that. In all probability the hon. Member himself has taken what I said to heart, because the same thing could have applied to himself.

Mr. Fraser: The hon. Member said that my hon. Friend the Member for Greenock had perpetrated a fraud on the people of Greenock because he supported the war effort while he was not in uniform. I admit that the cap, fits me as it fits my hon. Friend, but we can have opinions about the war without being necessarily in uniform.

Mr. McGovern: That is something I do not understand.

Mr. Fraser: It is something the hon. Member does not wish to understand. I know that my hon. Friend's constituents and my constituents would not be pleased if we gave up our responsibilities here in order to go into uniform. If we had been in other employment earlier in the war we would not have had any choice in the matter; we would have been in the Forces. However, let me pass from that and say how glad I was that my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Sloan) said something on behalf of the local authorities on this matter of housing. It

seems to be common form these days to apportion responsibility, and here let me say that I agreed with the hon. Member for Shettleston when he discussed apportioning responsibility. Local authorities are certainly not responsible for the deplorable housing conditions in Scotland. The local authorities, given the responsibility, labour, materials and sites, are quite able to do the job as well as the Secretary of State himself, should he assume complete responsibility. They are no less able to do it than the Special Housing Association. Members of local authorities in Scotland are just as much alive to the need for housing as any of us in this House. Indeed, they are more alive, because they are more closely associated with the needs of the people and the deplorable housing conditions in which many of them live.
I have talked over this matter with my local authorities. I discovered that in Hamilton sites for 2,000 houses have been approved. Our housing needs, before the war, were estimated at some 3,500. We are awaiting man-power and materials in order to go ahead with the job. I am sure that the local authorities are just as competent to do the work as the Special Housing Association, or any other centralised authority. I discovered that a similar situation existed in Lanarkshire, although I regret to say that there more sites have not been approved.
My hon. Friend the Member for Greenock asked for an assurance that the allocations of temporary houses, made by the Secretary of State, would be honoured and not affected by the statement made the other day by the Minister of Works. I, also, would like the assurance from my right hon. Friend that the allocations made up to the present are only the first instalment of the programme. I say that not because I am particularly keen on temporary houses but because, like Other Members, I appreciate that we have to have them, that we cannot have permanent houses within the next five, six or ten years, and that we must do all in our power to get the greatest number of houses built at the earliest possible moment.
If I refer to conditions in a part of my constituency I do so only because I think they are applicable to vast industrial areas in the West of Scotland. I received some figures the other day concerning an indus-


trial village in my division, in which there are 150 houses. Overcrowding in that village is deplorable. I asked a good friend of mine to take a census and he said it was ridiculous to do so by ordinary standards as the result would be 100 per cent. overcrowding. I then asked him to go into the matter on the basis of three units, adults, per apartment. He was able to tell me that there is still 75 per cent. overcrowding in that village. Of the 150 houses 84 are sub-let, most of them being two-apartment houses. That, surely, is the answer to those who argue that a temporary housing scheme is no solution to the problem of overcrowding. Much of the overcrowding in that village, as in any other village in the West of Scotland, is attributable to the large number of sub-lets. There are dilapidated houses, nearly 100 years old, in that village for which the local authorities are not responsible. We have been pestering the factor, the local authority, all responsible authorities, to make the houses more habitable, but nothing has been done yet. The other day when a deputation of house-holders went to the factor he made them an offer.
He offered to sell them the houses at £3 per house. Not one of the house-holders accepted the offer. That will give some idea of the state that they are in. The people go on paying rent for them though the water comes in at the top and at the bottom. They cannot be put into a fit state. It may be that something could be done to tide them over another winter, but something must be done to provide alternative accommodation at the earliest moment.
My hon. Friend the Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) said something about taking men out of the Army. He said it was not only the labour and the skill of these people that we were losing. There are no apprentices being trained, and so long as these men remain in the Services, as long as the building trade personnel remains at its present low level, we cannot have apprentices trained. There are many building trade workers in the Forces and in war industries who could be released. I plead with the Secretary of State to make the necessary representations to the Minister of Labour to have these people used to the best advantage, not only because of their own skill and industry but because of the advantage that they can

be to us in the years to come in the training of these young people. I cannot agree that only the Secretary of State is responsible in these matters. I think the Ministry of Labour and the Minister of Works come into it.

Mr. Buchanan: The constitutional practice, which I hope will continue, is to fix a Minister with responsibility. Once you vary that, you can never challenge any matter at all. It may be true that others come into it but the Parliamentary responsibility must always be fixed on one man, and that man is the Secretary of State.

Mr. Fraser: I appreciate my hon. Friend's observation, but there is a tendency to ignore the responsibility of other Departments and to fix our attention on one. These Scottish Debates always trail behind the English Debates, when attention is properly focused on the responsibility of other Departments. It is not unfitting that we too should be fully aware of the responsibility of other Departments in these matters. The war hitherto has been used as an excuse for not going on with house building. I agree that it is a very legitimate excuse, but let it also be recognised that the war, and the fact of the part the people have played in it, should be used, not as an excuse for not having houses but rather as a reason for leaving no stone unturned to have houses provided as early as possible.

5.55 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. T. Johnston): When the time comes for me to hand in my ticket I shall have to look back on many sins of omission and commission. But one which I think I can honestly say I am free from is lack of appreciation of the magnitude of the housing problem. I am glad to say, too, that outside bodies with whom we are in pretty close contact, and who know something about the administrative difficulties, appreciate the efforts we have been making in very difficult circumstances to prepare the way, when conditions are a little more favourable, for a great attack upon the horrible housing conditions in our country. Several hon. Members have said there ought to be no politics in this. I am happy to say that the Communist Party take that view too. They have sent me a letter of thanks. [An HON. MEMBER: "For what?"] They know


the efforts that we have been making with the very limited opportunities at our hand to deal with the problem. The Scottish Labour Party executive and the local authorities say the same thing.
I agree with the hon. Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Sloan) that this is a problem which the present generation has inherited. This generation did not create 400,000 houses without an internal water-closet. This generation inherited great responsibilities, though they inherited great opportunities too, and it must be remembered, in fairness to this generation, that we rebuilt about one-fifth of the housing in our country in the period between the two wars. Between 1919 and 1943 local authorities, with subsidy, built 241,535 houses. They built others without subsidies. The Special Housing Association have built houses and the first and second National Housing Companies built houses and, if you take four to a family, that means a million people rehoused by this generation. Since the war we have completed 35,000. They were started by local authorities before the war but they have been completed.
When I hear some people refer to the quality of the labour supply that we have now, I do not forget that many who have been building these houses are older men, that the young fellows are very largely away at the front, and that the number of men—I do not think this figure has ever been given publicly before, but I am authorised to give it—under 31 in the industry in the United Kingdom before the war was 200,000 out of roughly 1,000,000. That is, about one-fifth of the whole were under 31. The corresponding figure to-day is 7,000, or roughly one-fiftieth of the whole. The burden has been borne by these men, and the 35,000 houses they have completed are a tribute to their work. I pay a tribute also to the local authorities who, under great difficulties, have on the whole done a magnificent job. There is a job that nobody would have if it could be avoided, and that is the job of convener of a local housing committee.
Many points have been raised in the discussion to which I will not be able, in the time at my disposal, to reply adequately. So far as I cannot cover the ground, I propose to send letters to hon. Members dealing with the points they have put. When I said that 35,000 houses

had been completed since the outbreak of war, that is only a part of the story.

It being Six o'clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Major A. S. L. Young.]

Mr. Johnston: We have built 1,500 houses in one Glasgow area for the Air Ministry. Emergency houses, some of them not quite satisfactory, have been built to the number of 600. Hotels, hostels and camps have been converted into houses, and we have built some houses for the Ministry of Fuel and Power. Here are the facts about the labour force. Pre-War, there were in the building industry in Scotland 106,000 men. These are what are called skilled and unskilled. This figure included skilled, unskilled, navvies, labourers and workmen of all kinds. Of this number, 61,000 were scheduled as craftsmen and 45,000 as unskilled workmen. To-day we have fewer than one-third of the total, and this one-third is engaged in building of all kinds, aerodromes, camps and harbours; some of them on ship-fitting, and many of them on maintenance of existing fabrics. We have at the moment, according to the latest figures, only 3,100 engaged in building houses.
I have been asked repeatedly to-day what are the prospects of temporary housing. One hon. Member said that the Minister had killed the Portal house in the recent Debate. That is not so. As a matter of fact, my right hon. Friend is doing his best to increase the production of the temporary house; but it is true that one precise type of construction of temporary houses, that is the steel-shell house——

Mr. Buchanan: The Portal house.

Mr. Johnston: There are other types of steel house beside the Portal house.

Mr. Buchanan: But the Portal house was the one referred to.

Mr. Sloan: We have always understood that the Portal house was a steel house.

Mr. Johnston: May I draw attention to the fact that when the Portal house was first proposed and described as a steel house, hon. Members in all parts of this Chamber pressed the Government to vary


the types of construction, and not to rely upon the steel-framed house? The Government, for war-time reasons, decided that, in view of the national emergency, it was better to postpone this particular steel-framed type—steel-shell type, rather—and to go ahead with other types. That is what is being done, but the temporary emergency house has not been killed.

Mr. Erskine-Hill: Do those war-time conditions apply now?

Mr. Johnston: Certainly. The temporary houses are being proceeded with as rapidly as possible. We have to take the thing in two stages. We have, first of all, to get the land. It is no earthly use providing temporary houses unless you have the land to put them on. We have the land in Scotland. We now have land for about 90,000 houses. The next problem we have to face is——

Mr. Sloan: The trouble of getting the houses.

Mr. Johnston: No. I think I can show the hon. Member that he is wrong. The next problem is to get the land serviced—to get drains, to put in a water supply, to make access roads, and other roads. It is no use coming along with prefabricated emergency houses, even if you have the land, unless that land is serviced.

Mr. Sloan: My right hon. Friend knows perfectly well that in all counties, especially in the county of Ayr, the land is there and the services are there, and that all we are waiting for is to put the houses up.

Mr. Johnston: If my hon. Friend will permit me to say so, that is wrong.

Mr. Sloan: Does my right hon. Friend know the conditions in Ayrshire better than I do?

Mr. Johnston: I do not know anything about Ayrshire at the moment, but I can get the figures about Ayrshire.

Mr. Sloan: I can give them to my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Johnston: Please let me continue. I did not interrupt my hon. Friend when he was speaking. We have land, as I say, capable of carrying 90,000 houses. The land that is serviced is capable of carrying only 9,000 houses. It is, there-

fore, imperative that we get sufficient land serviced to carry the new types of temporary house, which I hope will be coming, first of all in a trickle and then in a stream, but beginning some time in the late spring. That is what I have to say about the servicing of the land. I beg hon. Members to believe me that the best information at my disposal shows that we have only land serviced at the moment for about 9,000——

Mr. J. J. Davidson: For the whole of Scotland?

Mr. Johnston: Yes, I am only talking about Scotland.

Mr. Hubbard: Does that figure include land in the process of being serviced?

Mr. Johnston: I think it is land which is completely serviced. We are doing our best to increase that figure. No doubt a large number of sites are in process of being serviced. If we have land for 90,000 and if we get the land serviced, and that means first of all technical skill, engineers, lay-out officers and so on, if we can get that, and can then get the temporary houses, the next stage is the allocation of these temporary houses. We invited the local authorities to tell us what they wanted of these temporary houses. We got their requests, and we allocated a proportion of their demands. We received 56,000 applications and we made a first allocation of 33,000. The types we hope to provide initially are what are called the Phœnix house, the Arcon house, and the Tarran house. Some hon. Members asked about the Tarran house. The Controller of Temporary Houses says that two representatives of Messrs. Tarran yesterday said that they have a factory in Dundee for the manufacture of their houses. The Minister of Works, I am further informed, is negotiating for factory space for the manufacture of two other types of temporary houses in other parts of Scotland—it may not be the Tarran house, but other types.

Mr. J. J. Davidson: I take it from what my right hon. Friend has said that we can look upon it as a certainty that the Tarran house will be the first temporary house to be proceeded with?

Mr. Johnston: No, I think the Phoenix house will be an early starter too. That


is a tubular steel scaffold frame, with a concrete cover. That is what is called the Phoenix type. I believe that will be an early starter in the race for the provision of temporary houses. We have then to face how many sites will be serviced. That is a difficult problem to answer. My endeavour is to secure that by the end of June next year the local authorities will at least have sites for over 20,000 temporary houses. If that be so then I hope, again I put it no higher than that, that by the summer of next year, we will have somewhere about 15,000 to 20,000 temporary houses erected in Scotland.

Mr. Sloan: We will take note of that.

Mr. Johnston: I am honestly doing my best.

Mr. McNeil: Does my right hon. Friend say he hopes that by mid-summer of 1945 to have 15,000 to 20,000 houses? Is that what he is saying?

Mr. Johnston: That is what I am saying as plainly as I can put it. I cannot put it more plainly.
We come to the question of what is called the permanent house. In the last two years we allocated 2,000 in two separate allocations of the so-called permanent houses. Recently, as some hon. Members have said, we have made further allocations on a small scale to Glasgow to enable them to keep their labour supplies in continuous employment.

Commander Galbraith: A very important point has been put by the hon. Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil). My right hon. Friend said, in reply to the hon. Member, that there would be 20,000 temporary houses by the summer of 1945. Just before that he had been speaking of sites. Is it quite clear that by the summer of next year we are going to have in Scotland 20,000 more houses?

Mr. Johnston: I was trying to explain that we must have sites serviced. We are endeavouring to have sites serviced, by the middle of the summer of 1945, to cover 20,000 houses. [Interruption.] I am talking about sites serviced. I cannot make myself any clearer.

Mr. Buchanan: I took the view that we were going to get 20,000 houses by the

summer of next year. In his own interests, the right hon. Gentleman had better make it clear, because we were all going out of this House to-night thinking that at the end of next year Scotland would have 20,000 more houses than it has this year.

Mr. Johnston: That is wrong. I say that we have the land in local authority ownership now, and we must get it serviced. It is no use having allocations of temporary houses unless we can put them on serviced land. By the summer of next year we hope to have land available to accommodate 20,000 houses, and by next spring we shall have a trickle, growing gradually larger, of these temporary houses, which we can plant on these serviced sites. The precise date by which the Phoenix house or the Tarran house, or any other type of house, will be ready, I cannot say.

Mr. McNeil: My right hon. Friend told us that he had sites serviced for 9,000 houses. What gain is there if you are going to use labour for servicing another 11,000, when presumably you might use the labour to erect 9,000 houses on the sites that we have?

Mr. Johnston: That is obviously a different type of labour altogether. The next point I must deal with is the effort we are making to speed up the necessary administrative arrangements. My hon. Friend the Member for Greenock (Mr. McNeil) made, as I thought, some rather unnecessarily offensive remarks about our intentions. [Interruption.] My hon. Friend must listen to me now. My reply is that, so far from there having been any delay on the Greenock houses, on the first allocation, tenders for houses were submitted on 15th July, 1943, and were approved on the following day. The second tenders were submitted for approval on the 5th July, 1944, and were approved on the 14th July. On the question of saving administrative time, we have asked the local authorities to give their powers over to their housing committees. Secondly, we have arranged with the Incorporated Society of Architects for the production of standard plans which we will offer, though not compulsorily, to local authorities, and we hope, by these two means, to do something to abolish the time lag in the preliminary administrative arrangements for houses.
Some hon. Members have asked about the Scottish Special Housing Association. This is a public utility corporation, operating without profit, on which all parties are represented, and proposing to build 100,000 houses. The local authorities knew about this fact and also that the 100,000 houses will be granted to the neediest areas, and that they will attract rates to the local authority, which will not be required to make a grant contribution. The local authorities are aware that, by and large, arrangements are in process with their concurrence and good will to get every aid and assistance that a centralised organisation, such as the Special Housing Association is, can give them.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: May I ask if it is a fact that there is obstruction by some authorities towards this Association? I have heard rumours of it.

Mr. Johnston: I do not know about the rumours, but there was only one authority in the whole of Scotland, and a small one at that, which said it did not want the Association.

Lieut.-Commander Hutchison: Will the right hon. Gentleman see that the electors are made aware of that fact?

Mr. Johnston: No, I do not say anything about it, because they may have made that decision under a complete misunderstanding, and it may quite well be that they may see fit to change their minds, and there is no reason why we should go about causing unnecessary ill feeling and trouble.
I was asked a question about Greenock by the right hon. and gallant Member for Kelvingrove (Lieut.-Col. Elliot). He asked if anything had happened about the efforts already made to get the use of the works department and the labour that was otherwise engaged on shipbuilding, sometimes at heavy overtime rates, in the port of Greenock. I do not know that the discussions were very animated. There were at first misunderstandings but, finally, I persuaded the Corporation of Greenock to listen to the Scottish Building Trade Operatives Federation. I will say this for the Federation. They went down to Greenock and told their men that it was quite within their permitted powers and the rules of their organisation for them to

complete a scheme where the contractor had thrown in his hand. I do not know the precise nature of the arrangements entered into recently but I will get the facts and take some means of letting my right hon. and gallant Friend and others interested know. There is no trouble whatever between the building trade craftsmen's organisations and the producers of the Weir steel houses. I have them sitting round the table and agreeing. Rules and arrangements have been made and I have great hopes that we shall get 2,500 houses—and splendid houses they are—per annum out of that Weir organisation. There are other types in addition which I hope we shall be able to secure, but the inescapable fact, as the hon. Member for Shettleston (Mr. McGovern) said, is the war, the shortage of labour. The labour is not there and it is no use blaming local authorities or anyone. The war situation has demanded that large drafts should be made upon the young men in the building trade industry and as long as the country wants that to be, so long must we be prepared to face the inevitable consequences, at a time like this, in house building.
I must apologise for the seeming inability to reply in detail to the many points, some of them interesting and some of them relevant, which have been raised here this afternoon. Rural housing, which my hon. Friend the Member for West Perth (Mr. Snadden) raised, has not been forgotten; it cannot be forgotten. But the whole housing problem is so appalling that it is going to require the good will of everybody and every interest—there is nothing that can be barred here—if we are going to meet within a reasonable time the great difficulties with which we are confronted. All I can say in conclusion is that there is no one at the Scottish Office but who is fully seized of the urgency of this problem. Tuberculosis is an appalling problem and my hon. Friend had better be made aware that there are as great difficulties there as there are in regard to the shortage of houses. We are willing to try everything in our power and within our competence to prepare the way and have everything ready whenever there is a labour allocation sufficient to allow the local authorities to start housing again. Private builders will be encouraged. No private building interest need be afraid. Every one can get a job, every skilled


man, and the 200,000 dilutees who are being arranged for in consultation with the building industry. There are plans for 25,000 apprentices being trained.

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: How many are being trained in Scotland now? I understand it is to be 25,000 in three years.

Mr. Johnston: I am assured by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary that the figure is 25,000.

Mr. Buchanan: Where does the Under-Secretary get the figures from?

Mr. Johnston: My hon. Friend can ask him later. I know that in Scotland we have 1,000 in training now.

Mr. Lindsay: They are under the age of 15. I know the facts.

Lieut.-Colonel Elliot: We want to hear the Secretary of State for Scotland.

Mr. Johnston: Everything and anything that can reasonably be done within the limits of our power, and with the labour situation as it is, is being done

and will continue to be done by arrangement with the building trade industry. I am told that in the United Kingdom there are about 200,000 dilutees being arranged for and also that there are arrangements for the training of 25,000 apprentices. I know that already in Scotland the education authorities have arrangements made whereby 1,000 are undergoing tuition for the building trade industry.

Mr. Alfred Denville: Mr. Speaker, this is the season of good will. Can we extend to you, and to all those connected with the House, our good wishes for Christmas? May the New Year bring lasting peace and happiness.

Mr. Speaker: I wish all hon. Members a happy Christmas.
It being Half-past Six o'Clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order, till Tuesday, 16th January, pursuant to the Resolution of the House of yesterday.